Brick By Boring Brick
by IceCreamAndPizza
Summary: While cleaning out a closet, Misty discovers a box of letters that she unknowingly makes a wish on. When a visitor arrives at her house, she thinks her wish has come true, but are things really as they appear? Idea based on 3rd Pokemon Movie.
1. The Visitor

_Forgotten the taste and smell_  
><em> Of the world that she's left behind<em>

It had been my job to clean out the old abandoned closet. I didn't want to have to be the one to do it, but my sisters were currently touring the world, yet again. As I reached into the pile of junk at the bottom of the closet, I pulled out an old wooden box that I didn't recognize. It was all dusty and worn, so I picked it up and blew away the dust that had settled on the top. When I opened it, I found that it held tiles looked like they had letters written on each one. I dumped the tiled letters onto the floor in front of me. Pulling from the pile the letters I needed, I spelled my name. MISTY. The tiled letters that spelled out my name looked ancient to me, representing an alphabet that I had trouble deciphering at first. As I pulled more and more letters out, combining them to make words, it all started to come back to me. I slowly began to remember which letter was which, no longer needing the reference guide provided in the box. Before I knew it, I had words spelled out in front of me like a crossword puzzle, overlapping with each other to create new words.

Even though I had created many words, I still had tiles left over that didn't quite fit with anything I had put down. As I glanced over the words I did have, I noticed that there was an open S that I could add tiles before or after to create a word. Flicking my eyes over the letters still remaining, a lonely H caught my eye. I knew I needed at least one more letter to create a pretty good word, so, I closed my eyes and picked one at random. An A. Grabbing the S from where I had placed it before, I set it next to the other two letters. With them all in a line as SAH, I began mixing them around, trying to come up with a word I could use. HAS. Nah, I needed something better. AHS. I don't think a word to exclaim fright was best. SHA. I don't even think that was a word. ASH. Not only was it the remains of a fire or a type of tree. But it was also a name. His name.

Go figure, out of all the words I could have come up with, it had to be his name. Staring at the name that I had to try to block out of my mind, I started thinking about him and how it had been a while since I had last heard from him, let alone seen him. I think he was in Sinnoh now, probably lost in some forest because he had taken what he thought was a shortcut. He was with Brock, though, so he wouldn't be lost forever. Man how I missed them. _I wish you were here_, I told the tiles as I felt a tear slip down my cheek, splashing onto the S.

Suddenly, the tiles flashed a deep blue. _Well that was weird_, I thought to myself. Having enough of going down memory lane, I wiped my eyes and swept up the tiles, putting them back in the box where they belonged. Setting them aside to take to my room later, I moved on to the rest of the closet.

XXX

"Look guys!" I exclaimed to the group behind me as I pointed over a hill. "There it is, Cerulean City."

"Finally!" Dawn cheered.

"Last one there's a rotten egg!" I called over my shoulder as I sprinted off in the direction of Cerulean City. It had been too long since I was here last. More specifically, though, too long since I had seen my best friend.

"ASH!"

XXX

After what seemed like hours of cleaning that dirty, old closet, I finally finished. I was all sweaty and covered in dirt and cleaning supplies, while piles of bags sat beside me, indicating what I planned to keep and what I planned to get rid of. Grabbing the bag of stuff I wanted to keep, I headed toward my room when I heard the doorbell ring.

Throwing the bag down at my feet, I walked the short distance to the front door, my footsteps echoing on the wooden floor. As I got closer to the door, I heard raindrops hitting the sidewalk outside. I guess in my cleaning spree, I hadn't heard the rain start up. Thankfully, I wasn't still holding the bag because I would have dropped it as my hands flew up to cover my mouth.

"Ash?" I gasped.

There he was, standing on my doorstep, muddy and soaking wet, an equally drenched Pikachu on his shoulder. He looked just the same as I had remembered him, except he had traded in his old hat and clothes for some new ones. His brown eyes stared at me, but there was something different about them that I hadn't noticed before. I know it sounded weird for me to say that his eyes looked different but, instead of the glint of happiness they always showed, they had an eerie glow to them.

"Hey, Mist," he greeted me. Even his voice seemed slightly different, but maybe, it was because he was much older now. "I've missed you."

* * *

><p><strong>So, there's chapter one. I'll take this time to warn you now that updates for this story will be very slow at first since I probably won't get much of a chance to work on it until the end of June. I will try my best to get a few more chapters to read while you wait. In the meantime, fill free to tell me what you think.<strong>


	2. Friend Or Foe?

_It's all about the exposure the lens I told her  
>The angles were all wrong now<br>She's ripping wings off of butterflies  
><em>

I stared at him, still not believing that he was even here in the first place. To add to it, he was telling me he had missed me, something I didn't think he felt. I almost pinched myself to see if I was dreaming, but I felt that might have been a bit drastic.

"Are you by yourself?" I asked him, noticing that there was nobody standing anywhere near him.

"Yeah. I wanted to come see you all by myself," he stated rather bluntly.

The Ash I know would have sounded a lot more excited-or at least I hopped- to come visit me. Plus, no offense to him, it was a bit odd that he had come alone, being one that usually travels with friends. Then again, time had passed since I had last seen him so, things could have very well changed about him.

"Would you like to come in?"

He nodded, walking through the door and into the hallway as I closed the door behind him. Pikachu hopped off his shoulder, and shook his body in order to disperse of the water he had obtained from the rain. Leaning down, I patted him on the head, receiving a sigh of content when I started scratching the spot behind his ear. At least, as far as I could see, Pikachu remained the same.

"I was just about to fix something to eat. Would you like me to make something for you as well?"

"Pika!" Pikachu squealed, while his trainer stated a simple yes before slipping of his shoes and following me into the kitchen.

As much as I hated to admit it, there was something about the way Ash was behaving that just didn't feel right to me. I know that people change over time, but the way he had changed was if he was a completely different person. I mean, he didn't even get excited at the thought of food, his favorite thing in the whole world. Watching him sit down at the table in the kitchen, I couldn't help but wish quietly to myself that Ash would start acting like the Ash I knew.

Thankfully, my cooking skills had gotten much better over the years since I had to now fend for myself. Whipping up a simple bowl of noodles-hey, I was going simple-I placed a bowl in front of Ash and a ketchup bottle for Pikachu. Pikachu's eyes glowed with excitement as he snatched the bottle and began licking the top.

When I turned around to grab myself a bowl, I heard a loud clatter as a bowl made contact with the table. "More please!" Ash yelled at me. "I'm starving!"

I just stared at him, not sure what to say. In the last ten minutes, he had done a 180 and completely changed his demeanor. Giving in to his demands, I made sure to give him two bowls this time, hoping he wouldn't finish those as fast as the first one. When I handed him the bowls, he threw me one of his famous smiles and thanked me. Yeah...Something had just happened to his brain. Regardless, I dropped it, and sat across from him with my own bowl of noodles.

"So how have you been? How was Sinnoh?" I started firing questions at him. Since I had only heard from him every now and then, I didn't know much about his travels.

"I've been okay," he sighed, setting his chopsticks in the bowl. "It's been great traveling in Sinnoh and everything, but it's just not the same without you there."

"What do you mean?"

"I told you. I've missed you a lot. I would have given anything for you to continue traveling with me."

It was weird to hear Ash be so honest about his feelings because he had always been someone who preferred to keep them inside. Although I wasn't complaining about his honesty, I was still surprised to hear him say that he had wanted me to stay with him.

"Me, too," I told him truthfully. I guess, maybe, I should start being honest, too. "Running the gym is really rewarding and everything, but it doesn't beat traveling by a long shot. It gets kind of lonely here, too."

"I'm sorry," he replied, throwing me a sympathetic smile. "I'll stay as long as you want me to. I don't want you to be lonely, Misty."

Although that was extremely generous of him, he had his own life. "But what about your dream?"

"My best friend is more important than my dream." Despite it being hard for me to believe, he was completely serious. His face quickly lightened up as he assured me not to worry about it.

For the rest of the evening, we spent our time chatting about the various things we had been up to. I had learned that, while in Sinnoh, Ash had traveled with a girl named Dawn who wanted to follow in her mother's footsteps as a coordinator. I had known that May was also a coordinator, but I still didn't quite understand what they had to do, or exactly what the whole thing was. From what May had briefly described to me before, it sounded like something my sisters would enjoy. He also told me about all the new Pokemon he had caught, and how Team Rocket had continued to chase them throughout the whole region. Same old, same old, I guess.

When it came time for us to head to bed-it had been around 9PM when he decided to show up-I showed Ash to the guest room and made sure he was all settled before I headed to my own.

"Misty?" I heard him call to me from the guest room. Turning around, I walked back toward the room and poked my head through the doorway.

"Hmm?"

He didn't reply with words, instead gesturing his hand to indicate he wanted me to come where he was. When I reached him, he gave me a hug, squeezing me pretty tight as if he was afraid I would disappear into thin air. Feeling it would only be right, I returned the hug, but not as tight. I won't lie. It felt great to have him hugging me. Ash had very rarely hugged me before, so this was a big deal. As I felt my grip on him strengthen, I closed my eyes. As long as he was here, I didn't need anything else. I would be happy if it was only the two of us. It felt like we were standing there forever before he finally let go and looked at me, an expression on his face that I had never seen before. Regardless, it looked extremely caring. Before I turned around to leave, he grabbed my hand to pull me back and kissed my cheek.

"Goodnight, Misty," he told me. "Sweet dreams."

"Goodnight, Ash," I replied. I doubt he heard me, though, as I was talking barely over a whisper.  
>The next morning I woke up feeling like I could take on the world. Yesterday's events had me floating through the gym lost in my own thoughts. First, my best friend had surprised me with a visit, and then, for the icing on the cake, he had kissed me goodnight. I knew it wasn't on the lips, but it was a big step for our relationship. As I mindlessly stirred a bowl of pancake batter, I heard Ash walk into the kitchen.<p>

"Morning Misty!" he greeted me.

"Morning Ash," I replied in a singsong voice, sounding more like Ms. Ketchum than myself. I was way to happy this morning.

He didn't say anything else as he sat down at the table with Pikachu on his shoulder and watched me cook breakfast. When I set the platter of pancakes in front of him, he immediately started digging in, filling his plate with a large stack of pancakes. I just laughed and shook my head at him, amused by his eating habits. Normally, I would have found them gross, but today, for reasons I couldn't explain, I found them simply adorable. He was like a kid on Christmas.

"What are you doing today?" he asked me between a mouth full of pancakes.

"I have to run to the Pokemon Center and pick up my Pokemon," I explained to him. "And then I need to pick up some food. How about you?"

"I don't know," he shrugged. "I would be more than happy to pick up the food if you want."

"Really?" I asked. "You would do that for me?" If he did, that would save me so much time.

"Anything for you, Misty." He smiled at me, a big grin on his face. This was, yet again, very out of character for him, but I wasn't complaining.

"Thanks," I smiled in return.

XXX

"You ready to see Misty today, Pikachu?" I asked the little Pokemon next to me.

"Pika!" He cried in excitement, although, I doubt he was as excited as I was. Then again, I don't think anyone was. I would never admit it to them, but I missed Misty more than anyone-except maybe my mom.

As much as I would have liked to leave right then and there, I had to wait for the rest of my group to finish getting ready. Brock would be pretty fast, but knowing Dawn, it would take her a while. Today was one of those days where I would pay anything for Dawn to take less time getting ready. The longer she took, the longer I would have to wait to see Misty. After a few minutes of waiting, I realized it would probably be a while before they were ready so, I headed out of our room and into the lobby.

While I waited, I figured I would spend some time flipping through my Pokedex, maybe actually absorbing the information I read instead of completely forgetting it the minute I shut the it. Sliding onto a chair in the lobby, I began my intense studying while Pikachu snoozed on my lap.

"Excuse me, I'm here to pick up my Pokemon." Just like when Pikachu heard something, my ears perked up in interest. I recognized that voice; it was her voice. Although it sounded much more polite than I was used to, it was definitely her voice.

Looking up to make sure my ears weren't playing tricks on me, I saw the red hair and yellow outfit she now wore. Yep. It was Misty all right. Abruptly standing up, I sent Pikachu tumbling to the ground as I rushed over to where Misty was standing.

"Misty!" She turned around, a look of confusion on her face. I really hope she hadn't forgotten who I was after all these years. If she did, then that would only prove how bad of a friend I had been. "It's me, Ash."

She furrowed her brow at me, crossing her arms. "I know who you are, dummy. What I'm wondering is what are you doing here?"

"I came to visit you," I told her. Phew. At least she remembered who I was. And, from her reaction to what I had said, her personality hadn't changed much. Although, I thought she would have been happier to see me.

"You already told me that," she replied. What? No I hadn't. I hadn't even seen her, let alone talked to her, up until now. "I thought you were going to pick up the food for me. I was going to the center, remember?"

Now it was my turn to give her a confused look. "Huh?"

She just sighed and shook her head. "Honestly Ash, did you forget what you were supposed to do already? It was really quite simple. All you had to do was go to the store and pick up the food on the list I gave you. I knew I should have just done it myself, but no, you insisted you do it for me."

"What?" I was beyond lost now. Like, more lost than I could get when I read the map wrong. "Did you hit your head on a diving board? This is the first time I've talked to you."

"What? No," she snapped. "And you talked to me yesterday. You came over, I cooked us noodles, we talked about your travels, and then you…Do you really not remember?"

I shook my head.

"You even kissed me on the cheek, Ash. Do you not remember that either?"

"I WHAT?" I hollered a lot louder than I meant to. "Why would I do THAT? You're not even that pretty."

This was apparently not the right thing to say because she suddenly got really angry with me. Just like the many times I had been on the receiving end of her rage before, her face turned red and she glared at me as if she hoped I would spontaneously combust. If it was even possible, this time, she seemed even angrier. And was that some hurt I saw on her face? I really hadn't meant to call her ugly; it just came out. Deep down, I didn't actually think that.

"You insensitive, little jerk!" she spat, slapping my cheek. It was then that she grabbed her Pokemon and ran out of the center.

As I nursed the spot where she had slapped me, all I could wonder was: What just happened?

XXX

When I got home I slammed the door behind me and raced upstairs before I collapsed in the hallway, too upset to walk any further. I couldn't believe what had just happened. He acted like he had never even seen me, like I was a ghost. And then, he didn't even remember what had happened, going as far as to insult me. How could he do such a thing? I thought we were best friends. I guess I was wrong. All I knew was that, if he was going to continue acting that way, I didn't want him anywhere near me. I just wanted to be alone with the people I knew actually cared about me.

"Are you okay, Misty?" I heard him ask me. Great. He had come back.

"Go away, Ash," I snapped. "I don't want to talk to you."

He just ignored me, kneeling down beside me as he placed his hand on my shoulder. "Misty what happened?"

This just infuriated me even more. I was sick of him playing dumb with me. I knew he was dense, but he was acting like he had short-term memory loss. He could tell from the look on my face that I was mad at him so, he backed off a bit and waited for me to calm down.

"You were at the center," I explained to him. "You didn't remember anything that happened last night, and then you insulted me."

I wouldn't be lying if I said that he looked taken back by my accusations. It was a completely different reaction from the Ash I had seen in the center who just looked confused.

"Misty, I would never, ever, insult you. I remember everything that happened last night," he tried to assure me. "Whatever you thought I said, I didn't."

"But that doesn't make sense…" I trailed off. "You were at the center. I saw you."

"I was at the store like you asked me," he explained. "Whatever Ash you saw wasn't me. Somebody is trying to trick you. I'm the real Ash. You know I would never hurt you."

Somebody was trying to trick me by impersonating Ash? It explained why the Ash at the center had pretended to know nothing about what we talked about, or why he insulted me. Although the idea seemed kind of crazy, I had learned over the years that anything was possible. Plus, he had always been pretty good about being honest with me, so why would he suddenly change that? I just didn't understand why someone would want to trick me.

"Whoever that Ash was, I don't want him to come anywhere near me."

The last thing I needed was some psycho walking around trying to trick me by pretending to be my best friend. The real Ash was here in front of me, and that's the only one I would trust. If people were trying to trick me, then I had to be extra careful in whom I trusted.

Taking a deep breath, I stood back up and dusted myself off before heading back downstairs. Happy that I was going to be okay, Ash stood up as well and followed me. Once in the kitchen, I grabbed the food Ash had bought, and headed off to feed my Pokemon. I didn't get very far, however, the doorbell causing me to have to turn around.

Setting the food on the table by the door, I opened the door to see Brock and some girl standing in front of me.

"Misty!" Brock greeted me. "Long time no see."

"Hi, I'm Dawn. I've heard a lot about you," she said, sticking out her hand for me to shake.

"Um, hi," I replied, returning Dawn's handshake. "What are you guys doing here?"

"We came to visit," Brock told me. "Right, Ash?"

Ash? Brock stepped aside to reveal the Ash I had seen at the center standing behind him.

"Hi, Misty," he weakly greeted me. "I'm sorry about what I said to you at the center. I didn't mean it, honest."

For once, he actually looked sorry like he had said. I almost thanked him for his apology, but then I remembered when I had been told just moments ago. This wasn't the real Ash; it was a fake. Whoever this was only wanted to trick me, and they were trying to get me to fall for it by pretending to apologize for what happened. I wasn't going to let them trick me. I was smarter than that.

"Go away, Ash," I sneered.

"What?" He looked kind of hurt, but I knew better. It was all part of his act.

"You heard me," I repeated. "Go away. I know you're a fake so, stop trying to trick me."

Brock and Dawn threw glances at each other, obviously lost to what had happened.

"Misty," he pressed. "It's me Ash. I don't know why you think I'm a fake, but I'm not."

"Liar!" I hissed. "The real Ash is already here, so go away. I don't ever want to see you here again." With that, I slammed the door in his face and locked it just to make sure."

Just then, I saw the real Ash walk over to me, a look of concern on his face. When I explained to him that the fake Ash had tried to trick me again, he got really mad and told me not to worry because he would make sure that I never saw the fake Ash again.

XXX

I stared at the red door speechless. If things weren't bad before, then they definitely were now. How could she not remember me and then accuse me of being a fake? It made absolutely no sense.

"Did she just say the real Ash was already with her?" Brock asked, breaking the silence.

"Yeah," I nodded. "That's not possible, though. I-I don't understand."

Something was seriously wrong with Misty. She had never acted like this before. I didn't understand what was causing this, and that only made me worry more.

"She's nothing like you two described," Dawn commented.

I know she hadn't meant for it to sound mean, but it still bothered me enough to want to say something to defend her. "Something's wrong with her. Misty's not like this."

"People change, Ash," Dawn told me.

"Like that?" I asked, gesturing to the closed door. "I don't think so, Dawn. I know Misty. There's something else going on." At least, I was pretty sure I knew her. Maybe, all along I had been wrong. I didn't want to believe that, though.

"And what might that be, Mr. Smarty Pants?"

"I don't know," I sighed.

Trust me, if I knew what was going on in there, I would be trying to come up with a plan to stop it. The problem was, I knew nothing, and nothing I had heard or seen was making sense. How could Misty claim that I was already with her when I was here? There was no way I could be in two places at once. And why was she convinced that I was trying to impersonate myself? These were all questions that I would have given anything for an answer to.


	3. The Emergency

_So one day he found her crying_  
><em> Coiled up on the dirty ground<em>  
><em> Her prince finally came to save her<em>  
><em> And the rest you can figure out<em>

For the rest of the afternoon, I spent my time trying to get some things done in order to keep my mind off of what had previously occurred. I had only seen Ash a few times, only when he would come by to check on me. It really was great having him here to visit. Just by him being here, the gym felt much more lively, and I now had an actual human being to spend my time with and to talk to. He even watched me and cheered for me when some trainers stopped by to try and win the cascade badge. When I was finished, I headed to the kitchen to fix myself some dinner. When I got there, I saw the answering machine light blinking, indicating I had a message. I pushed play and listened as my sister's voice took over the silent kitchen.

"Like, hi baby sis! I guess you're, like, busy now or something. Anyways, I was, like, calling to let you know that Lilly, Violet and I are, like, going to extend our trip. I figured you, like, wouldn't care. We're, like, in Goldenrod, so, like, call us soon."

It baffled me that my sisters actually thought I wouldn't care that they had forced me to take care of the gym for a longer amount of time. Here they were traveling the world while I was stuck here washing dirty swimming pools and fighting rookie trainers. This wasn't what I wanted at all; not by a long shot. I wanted to be doing what they were doing: traveling the world. I would travel with Ash and Brock just like the old times. They didn't care about that, though. In fact, they had never cared about me. It seemed nobody did. I wished Ash cared and felt the same way I did about him. It just wasn't fair. I don't know why, but I felt a wave of emotion as I slid down onto the floor. Within seconds, I felt tears sting my eyes as they slid down my cheek.

I heard footsteps echo through the kitchen, but I didn't look up. A smaller, more pitter-patter sounding footstep could be heard behind the footsteps. When it got louder, I felt something nudge my arm. Opening my eyes and looking down, I saw a very concerned looking Pikachu staring back at me. I moved my arm so that he could climb onto my shoulder, where he nudged my cheek in a comforting manner.

"Why are you crying Misty?" I heard Ash ask me.

I didn't say anything, instead pointing to the answering machine. He walked over and pressed play, my sister Daisy's voice ringing through the kitchen once again. Ash listened to the whole message before I heard him hit the delete button, erasing the message for good.

"They don't care," I told him. "They never cared and they never will. Nobody does."

He turned and looked at me, hurt evident on his face. Like he had earlier that day, he kneeled in front of me. "I care about you," he told me. "I care about you more than anyone."

"What do you mean?" I sniffled, lifting my head to look at him.

"What I'm trying to say is that I love you."

As if to confirm it, he leaned in close to my face and kissed me. I didn't say anything, instead choosing to use my actions to show my answer. All I could focus on as I kissed him back was how he had seemed to know exactly what I wanted. It was if he could read my mind. He pulled back and looked at me with a big grin. He grabbed my hand and pulled me up off the ground, insisting that I get something to eat.

I don't know why, but the thought of food made me think of Ash's house and all the amazing food his mom had cooked for us. I had always loved Ash's house and the way it actually felt like home to me. Maybe, one day, I would have a house like that, too. And maybe, he would be there, too. Closing my eyes, I thought of the house in Pallet that I called home and how I wished that were true.

When I opened my eyes, I found that everything around me had changed. Ash and I were no longer in my kitchen, instead in somewhere completely new. Looking around the room, I started to recognize some of the items that were there. _No way_, I thought. _I can't actually be where I think I am. _There was no way I had suddenly been transported to the Ketchum's kitchen. I just wasn't possible.

"Where are we?" I asked Ash, who was luckily still there. Unlike me, though, he looked completely unfazed.

"We're at my house," he told me. "This is what you wanted, right?"

"Yeah," I slowly nodded. How had he known what I wanted?

He looked relieved, a small smile appearing on his face as he grabbed my hand and led me out of the kitchen. From the kitchen, we walked into the Ketchum's family room where everything was how I had remembered it. Next, he pulled me up the steps and into his room, where it looked as if nobody had touched it in years.

I must have been dreaming for this to be happening. First Ash telling me he loved me, and then finding myself in the one place on earth that I called home? These were all things that I had only dreamed about. I must be sleeping, only to awake in a few hours or so. And that Ash, Brock and Dawn I had seen earlier today? They had to be part of it, too. Maybe that was all just part of a nightmare, and here was my actual dream. It explained why Ash knew what I had wanted. Since he was part of my dream, he knew everything I dreamed and wished about without me having to say it out loud. I wished it to be true, he could make it all happen. Amazing.

XXX

Things had been pretty quiet since we returned to the center, nobody really knowing what to say, especially to me. It didn't matter to me what Dawn said because I knew that there was something fishy about what was happening to Misty. Despite what Dawn may have thought, people didn't change like that as suddenly as Misty had. Since we weren't able to get into the gym, we didn't know what to do next. I didn't want to leave Cerulean until I figured out what was going on, but Dawn didn't really want to stick around if Misty wasn't going to let us in. Somehow, though, Brock had gotten her to agree to stay for at least two more days before, if we couldn't get in, we would just leave and go back to Pallet. I just hoped it didn't come to that.

"Is there an Ash Ketchum here?" I heard Nurse Joy call to the people in the lobby.

"Right here," I replied, walking up to the front desk.

"You have a phone call from Pallet," she told me. Hmm. I bet it was my mom.

When I sat down in the phone booth, I was really surprised to hear Professor Oak's voice greeting me on the other line.

"Uh, hi," I answered, my voice clearly expressing surprise. "What's up?"

"Ash, you need to come home as soon as you can. Your mother has fallen ill and she's in the hospital."

"What's wrong? Is she going to be okay? When did this happen?" I fired question after question at him, trying to get to the bottom of it.

"They don't know yet, but the sooner you get here the better."

"Okay," I nodded. "I can be there in two days if I leave tonight."

"Alright. I must go now. I'll see you then. Please hurry," he said before hanging up, leaving me staring at a blank screen.

I continued staring at the screen while I took in everything I had just discovered. I really hoped my mom was okay and that it wasn't anything serious. I didn't know what I'd do if I were to lose her, especially if I wasn't there. I knew if I walked it would take me four days, but I needed to get there much faster than that. If I could somehow get to Viridian by at least tomorrow afternoon, I could reach Pallet by the morning after. But how was I going to get to Viridian City that quickly? Maybe Brock and Dawn could help me figure it out. Standing up, I quickly rushed to our room where I found Brock reading a Breeding magazine and Dawn talking to Piplup.

"What's wrong, Ash? You look like you saw a ghastly," Dawn observed.

"It's my mom," I told them. "Professor Oak just called me and told me that she's really sick. I need to get back to Pallet as soon as I can."

"That's terrible," Dawn gasped.

"When are you leaving?" Brock asked me.

"I want to leave in the next two hours, but I don't know how I'm going to get there in time. If I walk, it will take me about 4 days, and I don't have that time. I told Professor Oak that I'd be there in two days, but I want to get there tomorrow afternoon if possible."

"Tomorrow afternoon? But, Ash, that's impossible if you walk. You'd have to take a train or fly there, Dawn told me.

"Ask Liza to send over Charizard for you," Brock suggested.

Charizard? That's it! Without saying anything, I ran out of the room and back into the lobby to call Liza. If I flew with Charizard, I could get to Pallet Town in no time. Although I wouldn't be able to get to Pallet tomorrow afternoon, I could at least get there the morning of the day after. All I would need to do would be to stop for an hour or two in Viridian to rest up and I would be good.

XXX

I couldn't seem to get enough of my dream world, things finally starting to go the way I had only dreamed of. Since I knew I would probably awaken from this, I wanted to make sure I got as much as I could out of it, even if it was just for a few more hours. To make sure I hadn't woken up yet, I would glance over at Ash to make sure he was still sitting next to me. As I did this, though, there was something about him that I felt was missing.

"I wish you still wore the outfit you had when I first met you," I told him. "And your hat. You always loved that thing."

"Okay," he replied. He suddenly started glowing as I saw the black vest he had on get replaced with the blue jacket and black shirt combo, while in his hands appeared his old Pokemon League hat. When he stopped glowing, the Ash in front of me looked exactly like the one I had met on the first day of his journey.

I was really happy to see Ash the way I had always loved, but I still felt like something was missing about him.

"What's wrong Misty?" he asked, noticing my dejected look.

"I just feel like something is missing," I told him. "I don't know what it is, though."

He simply nodded, not knowing what it was either. I looked back at him and Pikachu who was resting on his lap. When I saw Pikachu sleeping soundly in his arms, I started to remember the one thing I had always missed even more than Ash: Togepi. I had raised my Togepi since the day it had hatched up until the day it had to leave. I knew what had to do, but I still didn't want to give it up. Remembering Togepi only brought tears to my eyes.

"Misty?" he called out my name.

"I miss my Togepi," I told him. "I wish I had it with me. I never wanted it to leave."

He smiled sympathetically at me before he grabbed my hands and pulled them apart.

"Toge?" I heard something trill from below me. No way. It couldn't me.  
>Looking down, I saw MY Togepi sitting in my lap looking up at me. Only, it wasn't a Togepi, but a Togetic just like I had left it at Mirage Kingdom. I embraced the egg Pokemon, holding it tight, scared it would vanish in my arms any second. It tried the best it could to hug me back.<p>

"Thank you Ash." This was the best thing I could have ever wished for.

"You're welcome, Misty."

"Look Togetic," I said, trying to catch the Pokemon's attention, "its Ash and Pikachu. Remember them?"

I was expecting Togetic to light up when it saw Pikachu and Ash, but it suddenly turned defensive as it floated up in the air, yelling at them in its language. The next thing I knew, it was tackled Pikachu off of Ash's shoulder, sending him to the ground. What had gotten into Togetic? It had always loved Ash and Pikachu. Now it was acting like it felt threatened by them.

XXX

Ten minutes later, I returned with Charizard's Pokeball to quickly pack up my things and head out.

"I'll call you guys when I get to Viridian," I told them.

"But, Ash," Dawn protested. "We're coming with you."

Brock, who was standing next to her, nodded in agreement. In most circumstances, I would have been fine with them tagging along, but they needed to stay here in case anything happened to Misty.

"No. I need you two to stay here and keep trying to reach Misty. She won't let me in because she thinks I'm fake, but she might let you two in." This was met with protests from both sides, claiming that we could always call Misty and talk to her. Knowing Dawn wouldn't understand, I looked at Brock, pleading with him to understand. "Please, Brock. You have to stay here. I'm really worried about her, and I know you are, too. I just want to make sure she's okay. You two promised me we could stay two more days. I need to know what's going on in that gym, but, my mom needs me more now. Please, you have to stay. If you don't find out anything after two days then I'll have Charizard come get you."

"All right, Ash." He wrote down the number to Dawn's Pokegear on a piece of paper and handed it to me. "Be careful and call us when you get to Viridian."

* * *

><strong>Hey Everyone! Thanks for reading this far. I hope you still find it interesting. I will try to get one more chapter out either Saturday night or Sunday at the latest. Now that I have set up most of the story line, this next chapter will be when things really start going. After that, I have to study for exams. When I'm done, though, I will make sure to finish this story. Thanks to all for the reviews! It's always neat to see people getting into the story and trying to guess what will happen next. Until then!<br>**


	4. Creating A Plan

_She lives in a fairy tale_  
><em> Somewhere too far for us to find<em>

"Wow! This is amazing!" I awed from the top of the diving board. With a perfect stance, I dived into the water. When I reached the surface again, I saw Ash smiling at me from where he was sitting. With the help of Ash, in my dreams, the gym pool had become a never-ending ocean. It was as if I was stranded at sea, but still somehow in my gym. Swimming over to him, I grabbed his hand and pulled him into the water with me. "Join me."

"I'm glad you like it, Misty," he told me as he treaded water in front of me.

"Of course I like it," I giggled. "I love the ocean."

"I know you do," he smiled.

As we swam around in the ocean like, pool, my Pokemon floated around us, overjoyed by the change in scenery. To them, they saw this as nothing other than being in the ocean where their natural habitat was. Togetic, who had continued to act very strange, floated near the pool, watching Ash very carefully, afraid that he might do something to hurt me. I knew that Togetic was only trying to protect me, but this was Ash who I knew would never hurt me, especially after telling me he loved me.

"I wish you never had to leave," I told him as I floated on my back staring at the ceiling that had turned into a night sky filled with stars. "I know you have to eventually, but I wish you didn't."

"I can stay here forever if you want," he told me. "I'm happy now because I have you. I can help you run the gym, too."

"You don't want to do that," I corrected him. "I hate running the gym. I wish I could quit, but Cerulean needs a gym leader, and my sisters aren't going to offer to help. I liked traveling much better because I actually got to meet people and witness things I could never see if I stayed here."

He frowned at me in sympathy as if he actually understood where I was coming from. Don't get me wrong, I loved the gym itself, I just didn't want to have to be the one who had to run it. I wanted to do other things. It was my life after all, so I should have been able to. It was just that my sisters had pretty much controlled everything about my life up until I left those many years ago.

"If I was a water Pokemon Master like I always wanted, then I think that would be a lot more exciting."

"I see," he answered.

XXX

The next morning, Dawn and I decided to try and visit Misty again. When we reached the gym, it looked really different from when we had visited yesterday. First of all, under the Cerulean Gym sign, it said, HOME OF THE WATER POKEMON MASTER. I may not always have a great memory, but I was pretty sure that Misty had not become a master overnight. Secondly, the whole gym was surrounded by-dare I say it-sand and seashells. I know her gym was by the water, but it wasn't THAT close. What really confused me, though, was the giant moat of sea water that now surround the gym, where it seemed the only way in was to cross stepping-stones to the front door. I guess she wasn't kidding when she said she wanted to do some remodeling. After safely making it across the stepping-stones, we reached the front door where we rang the doorbell and waited patiently for her to answer.

"Brock?" She opened the door all the way this time, finally allowing me to get a better view of the inside than before. From the glimpse I got, the gym looked really different from the way I remembered it, but at the same time, there was something about it that seemed really familiar. "What are you doing here? It's been so long!"

It was kind of weird to see her happy to see me since she had flipped out last time. Maybe, after all, it really was Ash that had been the problem.

"We came to see you again," Dawn told her.

"Again?"

"We, uh, came before, but you weren't home," I lied. I didn't want her to flip out again. She just nodded, accepting my answer. Before she could say anything else, I tried to quickly change the subject. "So how are you? I like what you did to the gym."

"Thanks," she smiled. "And I've been doing well. Ash is here visiting so it's been really nice, although, there was this one person who tried to impersonate him and trick me. Ash told me he took care of it, though. Did you know we're dating?"

"I thought you said she wasn't his girlfriend," Dawn asked, eyeing me suspiciously.

"It's okay," Misty told her. "He didn't know, so that's probably why he said that."

"Ash is with you?" I asked her. She had told us this before, but I didn't really believe her at first. Now, here she was telling me the same thing, but that now they were dating. How was that even possible? Ash wasn't even here. I doubt he even knew he was dating Misty. Something just wasn't right here.

"Yeah. Do you want to come in and say hi?" she asked us.

"Sure," Dawn replied.

"Um, how about tomorrow? We need to go. We just wanted to stop by and say hi. Uh, bye Misty!" I said in one Dawn's hand, I dragged her away, not saying anything until we were far away from the gym. When we finally stopped running, she yanked her hand away and started yelling at me about how she could have gotten hurt. "I'm sorry. Something's just not right. That's not Ash in there. I want to make a plan before we go in there."

XXX

After Brock and Dawn had stopped by, I headed back to the kitchen so I could fix some breakfast. While I cooked a simple meal of pancakes, Pikachu wandered into the kitchen and hopped on the counter, watching me. Since Pikachu was here by himself, Ash must have been asleep still.

"Pika! Pi pi!" he started saying to me. Even though I had traveled with him for a while, I still could barely understand anything he said.

"I'm sorry Pikachu," I frowned. "I don't understand you. I really wish I could understand your language, though."

"Me, too Misty," I heard him reply. CRASH! The bowl I was holding crashed to the floor, shattering into many pieces. Pikachu leaped off the counter and ran to my side. "Are you okay?"

Backing away from him, I pointed the spoon at him. "Did you just talk?"

He cocked his head to the side. "Yes."

Then it hit me. This was my dream so of course he could talk. I had just wished to be able to understand his language, and now I could. I shouldn't have been that surprised. Wow. Finally, after so many years, I was finally able to understand him.

I picked up the pieces of the bowl, trying to pretend that I hadn't just freaked out. I now had a whole new power that would open up so many doors for me. I wouldn't need Mewoth to tell me what Pokemon were saying because I now had Pikachu.

XXX

After flying straight through the night, I had finally reached Viridian City. When I reached the center, I handed Nurse Joy Charizard so that he could get a nice long rest before we left later that afternoon for Pallet. Since we had flown through the night, I was pretty exhausted myself. All I wanted to do was curl up and sleep just for a few hours. Before I could do that, though, I had to make a few phone calls. Walking over to the phones, I pulled out the paper Brock had given me and dialed Dawn's number.

After about three rings, she picked up. "Hello! You've reached Dawn."

"Hi, Dawn. It's me, Ash. I was just calling to let you guys know that I just arrived in Viridian."

"Hey, Ash," Brock greeted me, popping his head in front of Dawn. "I'm glad you remembered to call. We were just about to head back to the gym. Call us when you get to Pallet, and we'll let you know if we find anything."

"All right," I agreed.

"Bye," Dawn told me.

"Bye guys."

Pressing the end button on the phone, I put it back on the receiver before picking it up again and dialing a new number.

"Ash," Professor Oak greeted me. "How are you doing? Did you need a Pokemon?"

"Actually no," I told him. "I was calling to let you know that I was in Viridian City. How's my mom?"

"Viridian City," he asked me. "I thought you were supposed to be in Cerulean. At least, that's what your mother told me. She said you were going to visit Misty." Huh? Did he seriously forget calling me yesterday? "And your mother is doing well. She's actually in the other room if you want to talk to her."

"The other room?" I asked him to make sure I had heard correctly. "I thought she was in the hospital. You called me yesterday and told me that I needed to get back to Pallet as soon as I could because she had fallen ill and was in the hospital."

"I never called you, Ash. I may be old, but I wouldn't forget calling you to tell you that your mother is ill. She's perfectly fine." He turned away from the screen and called for my mom to come where he was. I heard my mom's voice as she asked him what he needed. He explained to her what was going on, and she rushed over to the screen. "Here she is."

"Ash!" she barked. Why was she mad? "That's not very nice of you to play jokes on the Professor like this."

"Mom," I argued back, "I'm not making this up. He called me and told me you were sick in the hospital. Do you think I would honestly make something like that up, and then fly through the night to Viridian so I could make it home in time?"

She sighed, the wrinkles on her face showing a bit. "I guess not. I don't know why you think the Professor called you, though. Did you hit your head again?"

No. I hadn't hit my head again, but I was just as confused as my mom was. If the Professor hadn't called me, then who did? I mean I know it was him but it had to be someone pretending to be him. That was the only explanation I could come up with.

"I bet this is connected to Misty," I said out loud without meaning to.

"Misty?" my mom asked. Glancing at my face, hers quickly began to show concern and worry. "Is everything okay, sweetie?"

"It's Misty," I began, "she's been acting really weird. When we were at the center, I ran into her but she started talking about all these things that she had told me to do and that had happened. I had no idea what she was talking about, and she got really mad. When we went and saw her later, she freaked out and started accusing me of being a fake, claiming that I was trying to impersonate myself. That's not the weirdest part, though."

"What's that?"

"She said I was already with her, but I hadn't seen her or even talked to her until then." I paused as I felt the worry and hurt race through me. "Something's wrong. I can just feel it."

"I'm sure you'll figure it out," my mom tried to assure me. "In the meantime, though, I must be going now. I have to head home and fix Mimey something to eat. If anything else comes up or you need to talk, don't hesitate to call. And please call me first if you get any strange phone calls again."

"Thanks mom."

"Goodbye Ash."

When they hung up the phone, I started at the screen for a few minutes, trying to figure out all that had just been discovered. Why would someone impersonate Professor Oak and call me? Had they been trying to get rid of me for Misty? I didn't know what it was, but I just knew this was somehow connected to Misty. I needed to get back to Cerulean as soon as I could, but first I needed to rest up.

Later that afternoon, I woke up and headed back to the lobby to collect my Charizard. When I reached the lobby, though, I saw there were at least twenty trainers standing around watching the news intently. Since it was hard to see because of the numbers, I walked up to two trainers and tried to figure out what was going on.

"What's going on?" I asked a boy who was standing in the back.

"Something weird is happening at the Cerulean Gym. Trainers have been reporting suspicious activity inside and they say that the leader has Pokemon who are practically unbeatable. News reporters have tried to get in but they can't because they aren't trainers. And, as you can see, there has been a scenery change. Nobody knows for sure what's going on because, like I said, very few can get in. The trainers who have said they saw a guy with a Pikachu there with her. They think he might have something to do with it but…"

I didn't hear the rest of what the guy said because I bolted through the crowd, shoving people out of the way-some of them shouting about my rudeness-to try and reach the front so I could see the T.V. When I finally did, I could only stared wide-eyed at the news footage of the gym. The whole thing was surround by a giant moat, while sand and seashells covered the grass that had once been there. While the news crew continued filming, there was a large commotion in the background as tiny blue crystals started sprouting around the gym. As I observed the crystals, I felt myself gasp in shock. No way. She wouldn't have. How had she even have gotten her hands on them?

_Misty_, I tried to mentally tell the screen. _What have you gotten yourself into?_

XXX

"Misty! Misty!" Pikachu called as he sprinted into the main arena. "Help me!"

I whipped my head around just in time to see him dive into the water as Togetic chased after him, trying to attack him. He quickly swam over to me and sought protection in my arms. Togetic had continued to try and attack Ash and Pikachu no matter what I said to it. I won't lie. It had me worried because as a Togepi, Togetic and Pikachu had been really close. Now, though, it appeared as if Togetic saw Pikachu as an enemy.

"Togetic!" I yelled at the Pokemon. "You leave Pikachu alone. You two are supposed to be friends. What's going on?"

Instead of replying or yelling at me like it normally did, it gave me a look of hurt and betrayal before it turned around and flew out of the arena. Maybe it had finally listened to me, allowing Pikachu to finally be able to run around the gym without fearing being attacked. As I watched my Pokemon fly out of the room, my worrying about the way it had been acting only increased.

XXX

A few hours later, I once again found myself at the Cerulean City Pokemon Center. When I walked in, I handed the Nurse Joy my Charizard and asked her if Brock and Dawn were still here. She kindly told me that she had just seen them earlier in the cafeteria eating breakfast.

"Ash?" I heard Dawn call my name from behind me. I turned around to see her walking toward me. "What are you doing here?"

"Somebody tricked me into thinking my mom was ill. I called Professor Oak in Viridian when I got there, and he said he never called me. Then my mom walked into the room looking perfectly fine."

"Someone tricked you?" she asked to double check.

"Yes," I confirmed. "Where's Brock?"

She looked down at her feet, and twisted the tip of her toe on the center floor. "He's watching the news," she told me, looking back up. "You have seen the news, haven't you?"

"I saw the news in Viridian. Has something else happened overnight?"

"I don't know. Brock was going to check to see if there was anything new. I was just going to find him when I saw you." I think she could sense that I was very uneasy and worried because the next thing she said threw me off guard. "She's going to be okay, Ash."

"Thanks Dawn."

"Hey, Dawn. I think we better get over there-Ash?" Brock stopped in the middle of his sentence, finally taking notice of my presence. "What are you doing here?"

"Somebody tricked him," Dawn reported. "His mom was perfectly fine. What were you saying about the news, though? Has it gotten worse?"

"No, not really. Trainers are still the only ones who can get in, and they still don't know what's going on."

"Unknown," I blurted. They both started at me as if I was crazy. "Brock, did you see those blue crystals around the gym?"

"Yeah," he nodded. "What about them?"

"Do you remember those big ones that covered Greenfield? The ones that blocked everyone from getting to Molly?"

He pondered the thought for a bit before his eyes lit up, remembering what I was talking about. "How would Misty have gotten her hands on some Unknown?"

"I don't know. It's the only explanation that makes sense. I won't know unless I get into that gym." Brock nodded, agreeing with what I was saying while Dawn listened intently. I turned my head away from them and stared at the ground, not wanting them to see my face. "She hates me, though, so I'll never get in. She thinks I'm a fake, and I don't know how to convince her otherwise."

"I think I've got a plan," Brock announced, although, when I looked at him, he had a very sinister grin on his face. To make it worse, that grin was directed at me. "I'm going to need your help, though, Ash."

_10 minutes later_

"You're kidding me!" I yelled at them. "There is no way I'm going to the gym looking like this."

I stared at myself in the mirror, seething with anger at the terrible plan Brock had came up with. This stupid wig was extremely uncomfortable, and the blue dress Dawn had lent me didn't fit me very well. Brock had just been grateful that I wasn't much taller than Dawn. Stupid genes. They could have saved me. To make matters worse, the stupid shoes were to tight, and I had to shave my legs because –as Dawn yelled at me multiple times-girls didn't have lots of hair on their legs. As Brock helped me put on the final touches to my disguise, Dawn sat on the bed with Pikachu rolling with laughter.

"You look great, Ash-I mean Ashley," Dawn giggled.

"I hate you all," I glared at them.

"You want to get into that gym or not?" Brock eyed me.

"Fine," I huffed. This had better work.

* * *

><p><strong>Well, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and a few things were cleared up. If you still are confused and have questions, I will try my best to answer them for you so long as they don't ruin the story for you. Thanks to all for the reviews. Look for another chapter toward the end of the week.<strong>


	5. The Thread Unravels

_But it was a trick_  
><em> And the clock struck twelve<em>  
><em> Well make sure to build your home brick by boring brick<em>  
><em> or the wolf's gonna blow it down<em>

I was leaning on the counter reading a magazine when Pikachu came bounding into the kitchen. "Misty! Misty!" he called as he leaped onto the counter. "Brock and Dawn came back to visit!"

"They did, huh?" I asked him. "All right then. Shall we?"

Nodding his head, Pikachu hopped onto my shoulder and we headed off to the main lobby where they were probably waiting. Sure enough, they were standing there looking around the room, but next to them was someone I had never seen before.

"Hi guys!" I greeted them. They turned around at the sound of my voice.

"Hey Misty," Brock greeted me, while Dawn gave me a simple wave. "Sorry about earlier. We didn't have much time, but we do now."

"Don't worry about it," I told him, brushing it off. "I'm glad you could come now. I've really missed you."

He laughed and smiled at me. "Me, too Misty. It's been a while, hasn't it?"

I just nodded in agreement. "Who's your friend? I don't think I've met her before."

The girl didn't say anything, looking almost shocked to see me as she gripped the Pikachu in her arms "This is my friend, Ashley," Dawn told me, pushing Ashley toward me. "She's a contest buddy of mine."

"It's nice to meet you, Ashley," I told her. Hoping it would help her open up a bit, I threw in a compliment. "Your Pikachu is extremely adorable."

"Hi!" the Pikachu said. I guess, when I had wished I could understand Pikachu, it applied to all Pikachu.

"Uh, thanks," she squeaked. I guess she really didn't want to say much. Hmm, shy girl.

Figuring I wouldn't get much more out of her, I moved on to something else.

"I was just about to fix dinner if you would like to join me. You can wait in the family room while I cook it. Noodles, okay?"

"You want some help," Brock offered. "Maybe we could cook something a little more exciting than noodles."

"Sure. I would love that."

XXX

I felt kind of bad leaving Dawn all alone in the family room while Brock helped Misty and I did some snooping, but she didn't seem to mind. Pretending I had gone in search of the bathroom-At least, that's what I told Dawn to say if anyone asked- I started wandering around looking for the source of Misty's behavior. At first I had thought it would be hard for me to find my way through the gym since I hadn't been there in a while, but, I was extremely surprised when Misty showed us to the family room and it turned out to be an exact duplicate of my own home. Everything about it was the same from the position of the couches to the back yard where I now found myself.

From my past experience with Molly and the Unknown, I remembered that they had the power to make dreams into a reality to the person who was using them. In this case, that person was Misty, and everything that had been going on or that I saw were her dreams. The outside must have been something she had dreamed, as well as the inside of the gym being an exact replica of my own home-Why would she want to be in my house?-but I had yet to discover the other things. Although Misty wished for all of these things, in Molly's case, there had been something that made it all happen for her. With Molly, it had been Entei, but for Misty's-if the Unknown were behind all this-I didn't know who or what her Entei was. All I knew was that it would stop at nothing to protect Misty from the outside.

"I had a feeling you would come back," I heard my voice say from behind me. It couldn't really be my voice, could it? Before I turned around, I heard Pikachu growling at whoever was behind me. Whirling around, I came face to face with an exact clone of myself-well almost exact. The only difference was the blue vest and black shirt that I had worn when I first started out on my journey. "Although, I must say, I'm quite amused by your disguise."

Glaring at the replica of myself, I felt myself suddenly start to glow as I returned to how I had once looked before. Now that my disguise had been ruined, Misty would definitely catch me if she saw me. To make matters worse, the Pikachu that had been on Misty's shoulder earlier came bounding into the backyard, hoping on his shoulder. Just like my own Pikachu had, it started growling at me, electric sparks dancing around its cheeks.

"We don't like intruders," he told me.

"Well I don't like what you're doing to my best friend!" I shouted back at him.

"You mean making her happy?" he asked me. Although it seemed like it was more of a rhetorical question. "Visiting her? Staying around? Keeping promises? Loving her?"

I was speechless. It was then that I realized the enemy had found my weakness. He was me, so, he knew everything about me, including the things that had always bothered me. The things I had spent years trying to justify me doing; I was busy; I was constantly on the road; she had come to see me. He had me, and he knew it.

"I know everything about you, so you can't fool me. I'm not the bad guy here, Ash. I gave her everything you never did. You broke your promises to her, instantly replacing her for someone new like you replace your Pokemon. Promising to visit them, but never doing that. She came and visited you and waited until you came home. Did you ever do that?" He started at me, waiting for me to answer. I had nothing to say, so he continued on. "No? That's what I thought. You were never a good friend to her Ash. I on the other hand, am everything she wanted in you. She created me because she was sick of waiting for you to grow up and get it."

"You're wrong," I snapped at him. I balled my fists in anger, trying to throw him a threatening look. He was right and I hated him for it. I had been a terrible friend to Misty, and I had no excuses for it. I would still try to fight back, though. "Misty's and I are best friends. We both care about each other. That never changed."

"Oh, I don't doubt that, Ash," he told me. "Why do you think she loved you?"

I unclenched my fist and stepped back, surprised at what I had just heard. "Loved me?" I knew she had always thought of me as a best friend, but I never thought it was ever been more than that for her.

"I guess I really was that dense," he said more to himself. Great, now I was being insulted by myself. This was a new one. I guess this version of me was a lot more mature and, well-for lack of a better word-less oblivious to things. "Why do you think you're staring at a copy of yourself? Why do you think, in her dreams, you loved her back?"

She loved me, and the Ash standing in front of me was everything she had ever wanted in me. He was her Entei, making all her dreams come true. He was the one thing that was preventing me from saving my friend. She had created him to be everything I had failed at. If I had only gotten here sooner, only visited her like I promised, he wouldn't be here.

"Ash?" I heard Misty's voice yell from far away. I whirled my head around to answer her, but it was then I realized that she wasn't addressing me. She was talking to the copy of myself. She still thought I was a fake. She walked up to him, not even noticing I was there. Giving him a kiss on the cheek, she told him that dinner was ready.

"Misty!" I shouted at them, making my presence known. Misty turned around at the sound of my voice, grabbing his hand out of fear when she saw me. I glared at their intertwined hands, hating what he was doing to my friend. She started to pull him towards her as she tried to run away. "Please don't leave."

She paused where she was and looked at me, her hand still grasped tightly around his. I didn't know why, but seeing her like that made me feel sick inside.

"What do you want?" she asked me, or more like demanded to know.

"My friend back," I told her. I had to get through to her. There had to be a way. "I'm not a fake, Misty. You've got to believe me."

"No!" she shouted, the hesitation in her voice disappearing completely. "You're lying to me. I know you are."

"Mist," I heard myself sigh. This must have struck a tone with her because the anger vanished from her face, replaced by a look of surprise, "I'd never lie to you. You've got to believe me."

She looked at me as if she was contemplating whether or not she should believe me. I could only pray silently that I had reached her. I didn't know why it was now that she had decided to take the time to see if she would believe me, but I didn't care.

"Pi pi pi! Pikapi chu pikachupi!" Pikachu cried out to her. He ran over to her and stood in front of her, pleading with her about something.

Oddly enough, she looked like she actually understood him, even answering back to him a few times. When had she learned that? I watched as Pikachu's body slumped in sadness before he ran back over to me, sadness evident in his big black eyes.

"I'm sorry," I heard Misty tell me. "I just can't believe you."

I felt myself fall apart as I watched her leave with him. When she was out of sight, I collapsed onto the grass, the pain overwhelming me. I couldn't save my best friend, and I had lost her. I felt Pikachu try to comfort me, but it was no use. Giving up, I headed back to the Pokemon Center with plans of returning back to Pallet. I was no longer wanted here, so why bother sticking around?

XXX

Brock and Dawn stayed for dinner that night, but I didn't tell them about what I had experienced. I didn't want them to get involved, nor did I want them to think I was crazy. While we ate dinner, they seemed on edge, occasionally looking around as if they were seeing if someone was there. I presumed they were looking for Dawn's friend Ashley who had mysteriously gone missing. Giving up on their search, at one point Dawn announced that she had probably gone home, being very shy when it came to meeting new people. At around nine, they helped me clean up before heading back to the center to go check on their friend Ashley. After they left, I poured myself a cup of tea, trying to calm down.

"Why does he keep showing up?" I asked out loud about the mysterious Ash look a like.

"He's determined," Ash told me. I had forgotten he was there.

I sighed, knowing all to well about determination. Just like the Ash standing in front of me, this fake Ash was as determined as he was. He wanted me so badly to believe that he wasn't a fake. There was something about him that made me feel like he had been telling the truth, but he couldn't be. I knew he was supposed to be like Ash, but the way he had said my nickname-That only he called me, I might add- made it all too believable.

There was only one way I could find out what I wanted, and turning to Ash, I initiated my plan. "I want to know if he was telling the truth."

"What?" he asked, giving me a look of bewilderment.

"I want to know if that Ash we saw today is the real Ash."

He frowned at me before grabbing my hand and pulling me with him. We walked out of the kitchen, through the living room, and into the basement. When we reached the bottom, it looked like the storage room of the gym where I had been cleaning out the closet only days earlier. What was different about it, though, was that it was flooded with Unknown. They were rotating around in a giant circle, some of the tiles I had found earlier scattered on the floor.

"These are Unknown," he told me. "When you were cleaning out the closet, you found them and made a wish on them. Do you remember what your wish was?"

"That Ash was here," I told him.

"Exactly," he replied. "You wished for Ash to be here and when you made that wish, you activated the Unknown. They made your wish come true when they created me out of your dreams. I'm not the real Ash. I'm the Ash you created in your dreams out of everything you wanted your friend to be."

What? "That's not possible."

"Why do you think Togetic didn't like me?" he asked me. "You wished for YOUR Togetic, so everything about it was the same. It knew I wasn't real, and that's why it tried to attack my Pikachu and I."

"You lied to me!" I shouted at him.

"I didn't lie to you, Misty," he countered. "I simply made you happy. Every time you made a wish, I made it come true for you."

That meant everything these past few days had been a complete lie. It would explain why I could understand Pikachu, or why the gym so easily became the Ketchum's house. I wasn't just dreaming for me to wake up and it all be back to normal. I was living in one giant dream that I had created through my wishes. Elements of it had been real such as Togetic, but it all was giant lie. As I thought this through, I realized the most important lie of all. He never loved me back.

"He never loved me, did he?"

"I don't know Misty," Ash told me. "I did, but that's only because I was created out of your dreams, and in your dreams he loved you back."

Why did it all have to be fake? For once, I had been happy and Ash was here with me. In the end, though, it had all been one giant lie.

"Ash," I heard myself mutter under my breath. He looked at me at the sound of his name, but I wasn't talking about him. "I have to go find him."

Although him loving me had been one giant lie, I had to go find him. I had to fix what I had created. He had tried to save me, warn me from what was happening and I had just pushed him away. Called him a liar; told him I didn't trust him. I had fallen into the trap of the Unknown, and in the process, I had lost my friend.

Running out of there and leaving the fake Ash behind me, I ran upstairs to grab my stuff. When I looked at the clock, it was 9:45. The center closed at 10, so I had to sprint there if I wanted to make it in time. Grabbing some Pokemon in case anything happened, I ran out the door.


	6. In The Nick Of Time

_Well go get your shovel_  
><em> And we'll dig a deep hole<em>  
><em> To bury the castle, bury the castle<em>

"That's it!" Dawn cried, throwing her hands in the air as she leaped off the couch. "I'm not going to sit here any longer and wait for him to finish PMSing!"

"Dawn," I groaned. To those who barely met her, she appeared to be s sweet girl. But, once you got to know her, she wasn't afraid to show her true colors. "Just give him some space and then we'll go talk to him."

"No way, Brock. We've given him space. I'm tired and I want to go to bed." She stomped off to our room, seething with anger. I sighed as I stood up to follow her, making sure things didn't get out of hand. When she reached our room she lifted her hand up to knock on the door, making a fist. Just as she was about to knock on the door, though, it opened to reveal Ash who looked like he was going somewhere. "Ash? Where the heck do you think you're going?"

"Pallet," he replied, brushing past her.

"What?" she shouted, bouncing back rather fast. She caught up to him and placed her hands on his shoulders, turning him around so he was forced to face her. "Oh no you are not." This unfortunately knocked off Pikachu, sending up falling to the floor. He luckily landed on his feet, shaking off the fall before walking far away. She put one hand on her hip, while she used the other one to jab her finger near Ash's face, moving it around in the air as she spoke. "I did not come all this was so you could drag me into saving your girlfriend and then abandon us."

Ash's previously expressionless face turned into a scowl at Dawn's words. "She's not my girlfriend," he snipped at her. "And I'm done. You can go home if you want."

What? Did Ash really just saw what I thought he did? Was he honestly giving up on Misty? Since Dawn and I had been separated from Ash at the gym, we never saw him leave. I had wondered what would have caused him to leave in the first place, but obviously something had happened that caused him to be acting this way. Ash never gave up on his friends, so this whatever happened must have been pretty serious.

"You're giving up? Just like that?" Dawn yelled at his retreating figure. She wasn't finished, though. She once again raced to catch up with him, putting herself in front of him. I hated to admit, but she was starting to remind me a lot of Misty. "So you're just going to leave her there? Let her waste away in a big dream world where she thinks you're a big phony?"

"Yes," he stated. When he tried to move around her, though, she just jumped back into his way. I had never seen Dawn put up this much of a fight over anything, and especially against Ash. "Now if you don't mind, I would like to get to Viridian by tomorrow."

"Wow," she said rather sarcastically, "some best friend you are."

For reasons unknown to Dawn and I this seemed to really set Ash off. I could see his hands ball up into fists as the expression on Dawn's face changed from furious to shocked.

"You think I _WANTED_ to give up on her like that?" I heard him shout at her. Dawn, taken aback by his outburst, started stepping back a few steps to give him his space. As quick as his anger came, however, it quickly dwindled away, for the next words he spoke were filled with not anger, but what sounded like pain. "He's a much better friend than I could ever be to her. She's happier without me."

"Ash," I heard my voice call his name, "you don't honestly think that?"

He turned around to face me, allowing me to get a good look at him for the first time. His brown eyes that had always been filled with joy and excitement were completely dull. His whole body looked dead with his shoulders slouched and his feet dragging on the floor as he took a step forward. He looked like someone had just told him something happened to Pikachu. It was if his soul had been crushed.

"He can make her happy, Brock," he told me. "I can't. I never could and I never will."

Where was this coming from? Didn't he know that out of all the people in the world, he was the one that made her happiest? It was very obvious that something had happened to him while he was in Misty's gym. What that was, I didn't know, but I was going to find out. Or, at least, I would try to delay him leaving until curfew prevented him from leaving.

"You're not leaving, Ash," I told him. He glared back at me, annoyed by my attempts to stop him. "We're going to talk about this."

"What's there to talk about?" he questioned me. "She doesn't want me around and there's nothing I can do about it. End out story. I'm leaving."

I didn't say anything else, instead grabbing his arm and pulling him behind me. Despite the fact that he had grown, I was still much stronger than him so, it was pretty easy to overpower him. When we reached the room, I dragged him inside and let go of his arm before going to block the door. Clearly peeved at being taken here against his will, he stood in front of me just glaring at me.

"Ash, what's going on? I don't know why you think Misty hates you, because she doesn't. Ash, she…"

I don't know why, but I couldn't seem to finish the sentence. I really wanted to tell Ash how much he meant to Misty, but at the same time, I would be breaking a promise to Misty. I had known for a while how she felt after having her come up to me to seek some advice. What made her situation even worse, was that it was obvious how she felt toward him to everyone else but Ash. After that night, she had made me swear that I wouldn't say anything to Ash.

"Loves me?" I heard him say. Maybe he wasn't as dense as we all thought he was. "Yeah, I know." I was about to ask him how, but he cut me off. "And that's why I have to leave."

"But that makes no sense." If he knew Misty loved him, then why would he leave? I couldn't come up with any reasons as to why no matter how hard I tried. But when I saw him with his head hanging low as he stared at his feet, I finally got it. I just hoped I was wrong. "Ash, do you not love Misty back?"

Knowing Ash and the way he thought, if he didn't love Misty in return then he would try to run away like he was now. He would do everything he could to avoid confronting her and breaking her heart. I stared at him, seeing if I could read into his body language to get my answer. When I saw him tilt his head to the side in an attempt to avoid eye contact with me, I got this sick feeling in my stomach. _No_, I thought. He's going to break her heart.

"I-I don't know, Brock," he told me. Phew. Maybe, he was just confused. "I'm 16-years old! I don't know what love is. I mean I love her as a friend, but _REAL _love? I don't know. He loves her, though, and he can make her happy. I can't. And I can't be the one to hurt her like that. She's better off living in some dream world where I love her back and I make her happy then the real one where I don't know what love is and all I do is let her down."

XXX

I burst through the doors of the center, placing my hands on my knees, as I stopped to catch my breath. I was soaking wet from the sudden rain that had appeared, and my hair was now dripping droplets of rain from the ends. If I had known it was going to rain, I would have grabbed a jacket, but since I didn't, I was now chilled to the bone. And as I walked over to the couch by the fire, I could feel my teeth chattering a bit.

"Misty?" I heard someone call my name. Turning around, I came face to face with Dawn who looked really surprised to see me. "What are you doing here?"

I stood up from the couch and walked over to her. "I'm here to find Ash," I explained to her.

She gave me a funny look before saying, "Ash? Isn't he with you? You know, at the gym?"

It made sense that she was still trying to protect him since she didn't know that I had figured out the truth. To her, I was looking for the Ash that I had convinced them was staying at my house. The one that I had convinced myself was real.

"Dawn, I know the truth," I corrected her. "I'm looking for the real Ash. The one that came with you and Brock."

"He's with Brock," she told me, giving me a weary look. I guess some part of her was still skeptical of me. "He was going back to Pallet."

What? Why was Ash going back to Pallet? That made no sense.

"What? Why?" I asked her, surprise evident in my voice. I couldn't believe he was just going to leave like that.

"He…" She bit her lip and tilted her head, unsure of what she wanted to say.

"Please Dawn," I begged her. "You have to tell me why he was going to back to Pallet."

I needed to know why my best friend would just give up like that. It was so unlike him. He had fought so hard to get me to believe that he was really whom he said he was, and now he was running away.

"He thinks you'd be happier without him," she finally told me. "He keeps saying he's a horrible a friend and how he-whomever that is-can make you happy."

"You're kidding, right?"

"Do I look like I'm kidding?" she snipped at me. I guess she wasn't exactly in a great mood right now. "He was all packed up and ready to go."

Hm. I wasn't exactly sure who "he" was, but I had a pretty good feeling that it was the fake Ash who had been with me the entire time. When I had gone to tell the fake Ash that dinner was ready, the real Ash had been there with them. Ash must have been told something by the fake Ash that had really affected him. I mean it would make sense considering they were the same person. That would mean that the fake Ash would know everything about Ash, particularly the things that could affect him most.

"I'm sorry for all the trouble I've caused you," I apologized to her. Since Ash and Brock weren't here to apologize to, I should at least take the time to tell her. She didn't exactly know me very well. So, being dragged into this was probably not on her top ten list of things to do.

"It's okay," she assured me. "This is pretty much a typical day with your boyfriend."

"He's not my boyfriend," I corrected her. "Or, at least the real one's not."

She just rolled her eyes, muttering something about how I was in denial. In my defense, though, I hadn't said I didn't want him to be. Just that the real one was currently not my boyfriend. So, ultimately, I was right. I just didn't feel like bringing that up with her, though, since she seemed tired and fed up with everything.

Just then I heard a door slam shut followed by footsteps running down the hall. Since I was standing off to the side, the blur of Ash that went by didn't even notice me, focused on the doors that Nurse Joy was currently locking up. When he reached them, he came to an abrupt halt before slamming his fists into the doors, causing them to shake under the force. He slid to the floor, landing on knees as he hung his dejectedly, pulling his cap down to cover his eyes.

"I'm sorry your boyfriend's so melodramatic," Dawn whispered to me before leaving to go back to her room.

Standing up, I walked over to him before kneeling in front of him and placing my hand on my shoulder. At first I felt him flinch as he tried to shake off my hand, but I didn't give up. "Ash, what are you doing?"

XXX

I felt my whole body tense up when I heard a voice I recognized all to well. Shifting my eyes upward, I came face to face with none other than Misty, her green eyes meeting my brown ones. She was soaking wet and her side ponytail was now hanging limply on the side of her head. She looked kind of, I don't know, pretty. But what was she doing here? And why on earth, out of all people, was she talking to me? I thought she hated me; thought I was a fake. After a while I heard her sigh before she moved from a kneeling position to a sitting one.

"Ash you can't leave," she told me. Who was she to tell me what I could and couldn't do?

"Why not," I snapped back, talking for the first time.

"Because I'll be sad," she stated simply. Next she looked away from me to stare at something on the wall that was apparently more interesting. "Look, Ash. I know what's going on. What's been happening to me all this time. I know that the Ash that was with me, he's not real."

_No_, I thought to myself. She wasn't supposed to find out. She was supposed to live in her dream world and be happy. What happened in the time span I had last seen her?

"How?"

"He told me," she explained. Wait. He TOLD her that it was all a fake? Why would he tell her? He wanted to make her happy, and that certainly wouldn't make her happy. "There was something about when I saw you that made me feel like maybe, just maybe you weren't lying to me. So, I asked him to tell me who the real one was. He showed me the Unown and told me it had all been a dream."

She flicked her eyes back to mine, allowing me to see the hurt in them that she was trying so hard to hide. I knew if she found out she would be heartbroken. Instead of the Ash that made her happy and loved her, she now had the Ash that let her down and would only break her heart.

"I'm sorry for everything I made you go through," she apologized to me. I can honestly say I wasn't expecting that. "For calling you a fake and slamming doors in your face."

"Well, the slamming doors in my face isn't anything new," I told her. "But thinking I would impersonate myself, now that's a new one."

I heard her laugh, a small smile appearing on her face. I won't lie. She had a really nice smile. One that, for some reason I didn't know, caused me to smile myself. My smile only got bigger when I started remembering all the times that she got mad at me and locked me out or slammed the door in my face to prove some point she had to make.

"I guess your right," she giggled. "Your brain wouldn't be able to handle that much creativity."

Ouch. Well she sure bounced back fast. For someone who had previously hated me, she sure had no problem insulting me. I honestly didn't know if that was a good or bad sign.

"Gee thanks," I replied rather sarcastically.

"Calm down," she snapped, rolling her eyes like she always did at me. Standing up, she made sure to hit the brim of my hat so it fell over my eyes again. "You know I love you."

Sighing, I stood up and readjusted my hat. There it was again: Her statement of loving me. Why did she keep telling me this? Weren't girls supposed to be freaked out about the person they loved finding out? Then again, as I had learned over the years, Misty wasn't most girls. I'd worry about that later, though. Right now, I decided that it would probably be best if I stuck around and helped her take back her gym.

"Fine," I huffed. "I'll stay."

"Really?" she asked, disbelief in her voice. After nodding to confirm my intentions of staying, she crushed me into a hug. When she hugged me, I could smell her fruity shampoo and a tint of chlorine, things I always associated with Misty. The weird thing, however, was that they actually smelled good to me now. Good enough that I could stand there and smell her hair all day, although that would be totally creepy. When she pulled away, she stared at me for a second before throwing me an apologetic look. "I'm really sorry about that. Although, it _IS_ kind of funny."

Following her eyes, I looked down to see that the whole front of my shirt was now pretty wet. Right. I had forgotten she was soaking wet from the rain. When she had hugged me, I guess she hadn't been very dry yet.

"Yeah yeah, whatever," I replied, brushing her off. "Now what are we going to do about your little Disney Dream World gone wrong?"

"Well when you say it like that it just sounds depressing," she told me. "But don't worry. I think I've got a plan."

Well that was reassuring... Last time she told me that things didn't end so well.


	7. The Fine Print

_Well you built up a world of magic_

_Because your real life is tragic_

_Yeah you built up a world of magic_

"You think it's really going to work?" Ash asked me.

Everyone else had gone to bed, but for some reason he couldn't sleep, so when he said he was going to sit in the lobby for a bit, I had said I would join him.

"I hope so," I told him. "You really have no confidence in me, do you?"

"Nope." I hit him for that one. Some friend he was, having no confidence that my plan would work. It was going to work; I know it. "You're putting too much trust in him. He's not one to be trusted."

Whatever. I didn't care what Ash said; my plan was going to work. I had called Gary to see if he and his Umbreon could help us, and he had said yes, so he was already on his way. Since the Unown were physic, his Umbreon would be very useful in defeating them. Plus, in addition, he was bringing his Scizor and Houndoom, all of which could help us defeat the Unown. And, if we needed, I had my Starmie that knew confusion, and Ash's Heracross and Torterra that knew some helpful moves. Although, according to Gary, his pokemon were strong enough to take on all the Unown. Ash wasn't so sure about that.

We sat in silence while he twisted his cap between his hands. He had always done this when he was thinking about something he wanted to say but was nervous about saying. Usually after a few minutes he would say something, but this time, he just kept quiet. Once again, I could tell something was bothering him, but I knew him well enough to know that if I asked him, he wouldn't say anything. I couldn't get mad at him for it, seeing as I was the exact same way.

"Misty?" I heard him call my name. I guess maybe he'd decided to talk about it after all. "Why'd you do it? You know? Wish for a me?"

I bit my lip, not wanting to tell him. I thought he knew. At least, I had hoped that maybe, he would have missed me as much as I missed him. But, I guess he didn't know, nor did he feel that way.

"I missed you," I told him truthfully. "When the tiles I picked out coincidentally spelled your name, it made me think about you and how much I missed my best friend. It had been a while since I'd seen you last, so you can't blame me."

"No," he replied. "I don't blame you."

By the look on his face, though, I could tell there was more he wanted to say. He didn't, however, instead giving a big yawn, followed by a sheepish grin.

"Tired?" I teased him.

"Yeah, a little. How about you?"

"Exhausted," I told him. I had been really tired earlier when we came to sit out here, but I hadn't said anything. Plus, this was my bed anyway, considering there weren't enough in the room they had taken. "I could fall asleep right now."

"That tired, huh?" he laughed.

"Yeah. Too bad there aren't any pillows. I'll just use my bag again, I guess." Although they weren't supposed to, many trainers stole the pillows off the couch because they wanted more, or, because one of them had to sleep on the floor. They would always try to sneak them out when Nurse Joy was in the back room or had gone to bed. She didn't really seem to care, though, so long as they were all accounted for in the morning. As I looked around at the other couch next to me, I noticed they had stolen the blankets, too. Wonderful. "Seriously? They took the blankets, too? Stupid trainers."

"You used to be a stupid trainer, too you know? Not all of us can be gym leaders," he teased me. "And you used to be a pillow thief yourself, Mist."

"Zip it," I snapped at him. I didn't need him reminding me of how I used to be a pillow thief. That was in the past. I had turned over a new leaf.

"You know?" he said, his voice a bit shaky. "If you want, you can use me as a pillow, and I can go get the blanket from my bed and we can share it."

"What?" I asked. Did he know what he had just said; what kind of connotations were behind something like that?

"That's what friends do, right?" He tilted his head to the side. "Help each other out?"

"Uh yeah."

"Right. So, I'll go get the blanket and then I'll sleep out here with you tonight and you can use me as a pillow if you need to. I don't mind."

XXX

"You sure you don't mind?" she asked me for about the hundredth time. Unlike the other time, though, she pulls the hair tie from her hair and lets it fall down to just past her shoulders.

"I don't mind," I tell her as rests her as she rests her head on my lap.

Like before, I catch a whiff of her fruity shampoo mixed with chlorine, causing this weird feeling in my stomach to appear. Pulling the blanket close to her, she adjusts it so that it would keep her warm. Pikachu, who had insisted it not leave my side, hopped onto the sofa and curled up in her arms like it was a stuffed animal she was holding. Placing the pillow I had brought between the couch and me, I turned my body a bit so I could lay my head on the pillow without disturbing Misty too much.

"Goodnight, Ash," I heard her whisper.

"Night, Mist," I reply. But in an even softer voice I add, "I'm glad you're okay."

XXX

"Shhh! If you keep talking, you're going to wake them up."

"Pika?"

"Way to go. Now you've woken Pikachu up. Just hurry up and take the picture."

"I always knew those two liked each other. I guess it's a good thing, considering it's the only girl that Ashey boy will ever get to like him."

"SHHH!"

"Sheesh. I took the picture already. Calm down. You're cute, but you worry to much."

"Dude, no. She's ten."

"And a half!"

"No one cares Dawn."

"What are you arguing about?" I heard Misty ask. Great. She was awake. "And why does Gary have a camera?"

Now if it had been Ash who woke up first, then things would have looked a lot better for us. Unfortunately, though, this was not the case, and by explaining to Misty why Gary had a camera, we would be facing her wrath. Granted it was out in the open that she was head over heels for Ash-her little dream world our prime example-but us taking a picture of the two sleeping would not fly so well with her.

"Uh, no reason," Gary quickly answered. This, however, received a scowl from Misty. "I was showing Dawn and Brock some pictures I took of the Pokemon back at the lab."

"Yep," Dawn and I agreed, nodding our heads to reinforce it. "Ash's Pokemon are looking great."

"I see," she replied rather dryly. It was obvious she didn't believe us, but luckily, she wasn't going to press the idea. "Did you bring Umbreon?"

"Of course," Gary replied. He pulled a Pokeball from his waist and enlarged it before releasing his Umbreon. "We're ready to go if you are. That is, if you aren't already busy. If you know what I mean."

"Eww! No!" Misty cried, grabbing the pillow Ash was using and hurling it at Gary's face. "Never in a million years."

"You say that now," he retorted. This only infuriated her even more. If they kept this up, we'd never get anything done. "But when you two get married-"

"Who's getting married?" a now awake Ash asked.

"Nobody," Misty replied. She grabbed Ash's arm and yanked him off the couch, dragging him towards that exit.

Before Gary could make another snide remark to make Misty even angrier, I quickly followed them out the door and toward the gym. Gary and Dawn were alone on this one; I wasn't facing Misty's wrath.

XXX

"Ash!" I yelled as we walked through the front door. "I'm back!"

"Misty, I'm right here. You don't need to yell," the real Ash said. He was really dense sometimes.

"The other one you idiot," I snapped at him. "If you do this all day, I swear I'll go crazy."

"Well then pick another name for him," he ordered me.

"Fine," I huffed.

Just then the fake Ash walked into the hallway, the fake Pikachu perched on his shoulder.

"Red, I thought you said this was a dream world, not a nightmare?" Gary asked from behind me. "Thank goodness I'm here to end it."

"Can it, Oak!" I snapped back at him. His dumb jokes were not needed here. "Ash. Sorry. Fake Ash. Can you show us where the Unown are?"

"Very creative, Mist," Ash commented. Instead of decking him, I just threw him a glare before proceeding into the basement where the Unown were.

Sure enough, just like before, the Unown were all gathered together, chanting their name as they spun around. If my memory served me correctly from our Unown experience with Molly, we just needed to make them all faint, and then they would turn back into tiles. Once they were tiles again, everything would return to normal.

"So all we do is attack them?" Gary asked, observing the giant ball of Unown.

"Yep." I mean it seemed easy enough. Make them faint, and it would be okay. Granted it hadn't been so easy with Molly, but now we had Pokemon who were strong against the Unown, giving us a greater advantage over last time.

"Well okay then," he replied. Releasing his Houndoom and Scizor, he commanded them to attack.

As they were attacking the Unown, I saw a shadow ball fly by out of the corner of my eye. Turning around, I saw my Togetic hovering in the air a few feet behind me. It had been trying to protect me this entire time. It tried to tell me that this was all a dream. He had been right; Togetic didn't like the Ash I was with because it knew he wasn't real. Over the years we had developed this close bond, and I had failed to trust it, thinking I was right. And now, after I had pushed it away and thought it to be misbehaving, it was still trying to save me.

"Ow!" Whipping my head around one more, I saw Ash grab his side as he knelt over in pain. What had happened? Did he get hit? If so, I didn't see it.

Rushing over to him, I knelt down beside him and tried to see if I could see any blood or anything. When I didn't see any cuts or bruises, though, I got very worried. While I was beside him, he only cried out in pain more, continuing to clutch his side. There was no explanation for his pain, and that really scared me. Before I knew it, Brock was by my side asking me what happened as he tried to get Ash to move his hands so he could see.

"I don't know," I replied, my voice shaking a bit. "He was perfectly fine a second ago."

"It's the Unown," I heard the fake Ash explain. He was now standing beside us, a grim expression on his face. This, I assure you, did not make me feel any better.

"What do you mean?" I asked him, flicking my eyes between the fake Ash and the real one that was now withering in pain on the floor.

"Your wish. You wished for him to be gone. When my plan to send him back to Pallet failed, I made it so that if you ever tried to get rid of the Unown, he would go to."

"But you can change it, right?" I asked, but it sounded more like pleading. "If I wish for it not to be true."

He just shook his head, giving no explanation as to why. I think I literally felt my heart stop as it dawned on me what that meant. I turned toward Ash who looked really pale, his body slowly becoming unable to take the pain. If we tried to get rid of the Unown, then…then...he would die. All because of a dumb wish I had made in the heat of the moment. What had I done to him? I couldn't lose him. I just couldn't.

"Gary stop!" I yelled, or more like screamed.

He must have sensed the urgency and panic in my voice because all attacks stopped immediately, and him and Dawn looked at me with a questioning look. It was then, though, that they noticed Ash lying on the floor. At this, my Togetic flew over, observing the scene, while Pikachu, unnerved by seeing his Pikapal on the floor in pain, ran over to Ash and looked at me, wanting an explanation as to why. It was then that I started crying. How could I explain to Pikachu that I had unknowingly wished his Pikapi to be dead? And, that if Pikachu attacked the Unown, he would be only aiding me? I couldn't do that to him. This could have been avoided if I had believed them in the first place. And I call myself his best friend? Best friends don't accidentally wish friends to be dead. This time, I couldn't blame anyone but myself. For this; this was all my fault.


	8. How to Save a Life

_But if it's true_  
><em> You can see it with your eyes<em>  
><em> Even in the dark<em>  
><em> And that's where I want to be, yeah<em>

"Ash," I heard a name call me. It seemed far away and distant, as if they were calling out to me in a dream. The thing was, I didn't think I was dreaming. "Please be okay."

I flickered open my eyes enough to see some bits of orange hair above me. As I opened my eyes wider, though, those little pieces of orange hair were replaced by Misty's face as she peered down at me, a look of worry on her face.

"Where am I?" I asked her. I tried to sit up to see for myself, but she just pushed me down saying that I shouldn't get up. "Did we stop the Unown?"

She didn't answer, instead giving me a small frown before glancing at the ceiling and then back down at me. "No," she finally said. "You were hurt so we brought you here."

It was then I remembered what she was talking about. We had been fighting the Unown when I felt a sudden sharp pain in my side that was almost unbearable. I knew it was bad, too because I have a usually high pain tolerance, but this was off the charts. It felt like someone was stabbing me and then twisting the knife. The last thing I had remembered before I passed out was Misty yelling at Gary to stop. The odd thing about it, though, was that I could think of no explanation for the sudden pain.

"I'm fine," I assured her. They needed to finish the job, not sit here and take care of me. The pain was gone so I would be fine for now. "You guys go stop the Unown."

"We can't," she told me.

"Why?"

"We just can't," she snapped, her voice sounding angry and demanding. Now I knew that was usually how Misty acted toward me. But there was something in her voice that told me not to press it, even though I knew there was something important she wasn't telling me. "We're just going to leave things as they are."

"There is another way," I heard someone say near by. I watched as Misty's eyes widened as she slowly turned her head toward the voice.

"There is?" He voice sounded a bit shaky, but there was some hope in it as well. "You mean we can save him?"

Save him? What was she talking about? I assumed the him was me, but I had no idea why I needed saving or how I was connected to the Unown. I had a feeling, though, that what Misty had been hiding from me would explain everything.

"You and your friends must defeat me in a challenge," the voice explained. Now that I was a bit more alert, I could pick up that the voice sounded a lot like my own, leading me to assume it was the fake Ash who was talking. "It will be like an obstacle course, testing your abilities in a number of challenges. If you beat me in three out of the five, then I will disappear and your friend will be saved. If you lose, however, you may not try again."

"Guys," I heard Misty call to Brock, Gary and Dawn, "we have to try. We have no other option. Please."

"But Misty," Brock protested, "what if he's much stronger than us? Remember, you made him almost unbeatable."

"I know. But we have to try," she pleaded. "I-I can't lose him Brock."

Lose me? I wasn't going anywhere.

XXX

Brock, hearing the desperation in my voice, nodded his head. Despite all the different emotions I was feeling right now, I tried to throw him a small smile, glad that he understood. We couldn't just give up because we might lose; we had to at least try. I looked to Dawn and Gary who both nodded their heads, Gary smirking, excited by a challenge against Ash of all people.

"We accept," I told him, determination in my voice. I would try my hardest no matter what happened. Everything was on the line, and there was no giving up.

"All right," he replied.

After he said that, the scenery changed into a giant field. The clothes I was wearing earlier had been replaced with a blue workout jacket and black yoga pants. Next to me was a red flag, indicating our team color for these competitions. We would be competing against the fake Ash in who knows what, but I was ready. I knew Ash was determined and that his personality would carry over into the fake Ash, but I was just as competitive.

"You four will be competing as a team in a series of challenges," the fake Ash began explaining. "After I explain the challenge to you, you will, as a team, pick one person to go against me. The first challenge will be a swimming challenge. In the first part of the swimming race, you may not use any Pokemon, as this is a challenge of your own ability. In the second part of the race, you must select one Pokemon to race with. The person whom you choose must swim from one flag to the other, and then they must use their Pokemon to swim around another flag and back to the starting line."

As if on cue, Gary and Brock both looked at me, knowing very well whom they wanted to choose for this challenge. I was clearly the best candidate as swimming was in my blood. I would not lose this challenge, and I was pretty sure I could win. As for the Pokemon I would choose, I had a feeling that my Gyarados would be my best bet. If this was anything like the Orange Islands, I had a plan.

"We pick Misty," Brock announced.

"I had a feeling," the fake Ash winked. The field in front of us turned into an ocean and my clothes changed into one of my swimsuits. In front of me rose a small platform that we would have to jump off to start the race. "You ready, Mist?"

"Ready," I replied, stepping onto the board and turning to throw him a smile. My smile quickly faded, though when I saw him. His shirtless body had become a distraction, as I couldn't stop staring. I had forgotten that he was really attractive when he was shirtless.

"RED! What are you staring at? GO!" I heard Gary shout at me. In my daze of staring at Ash, I had managed to miss beep that would start the race. Now the fake Ash was no longer on the platform, already a few feet ahead.

I instantly dived off the bored and began swimming with all my might. This time I didn't even try to figure out how far ahead or behind the fake Ash was, instead getting into my zone. I must have been doing well because I heard cheers coming from the shore as I continued on as fast as I could. By the time I reached the flag, my lungs were burning from being pushed as much as I had pushed myself. As I suspected, Ash had not yet reached the flag, almost a hundred feet away. Releasing Gyarados, I hopped on its back and commanded it to go.

As we sped through the water, out of the corner of my eye I saw Ash behind us. I did a double take, though when I saw that he was on a Lapras. Ash didn't have Lapras anymore; he had set it free. I guess, since this was a dream world, the Ash could call upon any pokemon the real Ash has ever had. Determined to win, I commanded Gyarados to use an ice beam so we could slide our way to the finish line. I had seen Ash do the same thing with his Lapras in the Orange Islands, so I knew it would work. I could se the finish line only a few hundred feet away. I knew I was close. I could still win this if I didn't let Ash catch up.

All I heard was loud screams of cheering as I crossed the finish line and let go of a breath I didn't know I was holding. I had done it. I had beaten the fake Ash, giving us only two more that we had to win. If we picked the right people for the challenges, we could win, and more importantly, we could save Ash.

XXX

"The next challenge will be a rock climbing challenge. Whomever you pick must climb to the top of the mountain."

That's it? That's all they had to do? I was expecting something like, climbing to the top of the mountain, and then sliding down it. I guess not, though.

"This is going to be hard guys," Gary told us. "Ash is a good climber. It's the only thing I could never beat him at."

Gary did have a point. Ash was known as a human Mankey, being able to climb mountains and trees with ease. From what Gary had said, it was obvious that he was probably not the best candidate. That meant that I was probably next in line considering Misty and Dawn weren't as strong as I was, and I had grown up climbing rocks all my life.

"I'll go," I announced. They all nodded in agreement, knowing that this was our best option.

The ocean that was once in front of us changed into a small mountain with rocks that we could grip when we tried to climb it. Walking to the bottom of the mountain, I waited for the beep that would indicate I could start. Once I heard the beep, I started up the mountain as fast as I could, grabbing rocks and pulling myself up so that I could stand on another one. Thankfully, it didn't wear me out too much since I was pretty strong, but it was hard for me to stand on some of the rocks because I was much bigger than Ash was. As we had suspected, he was very far ahead of me, being able to climb the mountain with ease.

I wasn't one to give up, but it was hard for me to believe that I could actually beat Ash in climbing this mountain. I wanted to save him just as much as Misty and the others did, but me being unable to beat Ash wasn't going to help. With each rock that I grabbed, I pulled myself up only to have to try and balance on a tiny ledge. By the middle of the mountain, my feet and arms were starting to ache from having to pull my weight up the mountain. Ash was still far ahead of me, nearly at the top.

"Come on Brock!" I heard Misty cheer from the bottom. "You can do it!"

Despite her cheers of confidence in me, I felt my grip slip from one of the rocks as I fell, unable to catch myself. When I finally did, I was too far behind to have any chance of winning. Ash was nearing the top, a win in his future. And just as I suspected, by the time I reached the middle of the mountain again, I found myself standing at the bottom, while the fake Ash announced that he had won.

XXX

_No_, I thought to myself. Brock had lost. We were now tied with the fake Ash, and only three challenges left. In order to win the whole thing, we had to win two more. But if they were being chosen based on Ash's strengths-I hated to admit-our chances didn't look so good.

"AH!" I heard a scream coming from behind me.

It was Ash and he was in pain again. How could that be, though, if we weren't attacking the Unown? In fact, he hadn't even been with us, still laying on the couch, while we fought for his life. When I turned around to search for him, I didn't see him anywhere. All I could hear was his voice as he cried out in pain, but he was nowhere to be found.

"What's going on?" I demanded to know.

"Every time you lose, your friend suffers," the fake Ash explained. "You can't see him, but you can hear him."

He hadn't mentioned this before when he was explaining the rules to us. Now we had an even bigger incentive to win. I didn't want Ash to suffer the horrible pain I could only imagine he was going through, so we had to win.

_I'll save you Ash_, I tried to mentally tell him. _I won't let you die. _

XXX

"You now have only three challenges left to win. This next one will be a test of agility and speed. You may use one Pokemon of your choice for this challenge."

Hm. So it was speed and agility that we were being tested about? I really hadn't seen Ash recently, but I had a feeling I was still able to take him and his Pokemon in any test of speed and agility. This is what my Pokemon and I trained hard in. We had to be fast and agile when we battled. Plus, when we were kids, no matter how hard he tried I could always out run him in any race.

"I got this one," I assured the group. "You're going down Ashey boy."

The weird clone of Ash that Misty had created in her dreams just nodded before he started talking again, explaining what we would have to do.

"In this challenge, you must guide your Pokemon in hitting a series of targets. They will not be able to see where they are going, so you they must rely on your voice only."

Right. So, in this situation, Umbreon would definitely be my best choice. Not only did we have a strong bond but Umbreon was able to manage well when she couldn't see in the dark. Plus, I had trained her to be very quick and accurate in attacking, and I had a feeling Ash would choose Pikachu.  
>I called my Umbreon to my side before I explained to her what was going to happen and what she was going to have to do in order to win. Just as I suspected, I saw the dream Ash talking to Pikachu. I wasn't too worried, though, because if one this was for sure, it was that Gary Oak doesn't lose.<p>

"You ready?" Ash asked me. I gave him an affirmative nod before facing my challenge. "All right. On the beep."

Three

Two

One

The first target appeared right in front of Umbreon, while another one was to the left. "Shadow ball straight ahead Umbreon! Then to your left!" I watched as Umbreon hit the first target with ease, followed by the second. "Nice work Umbreon!"

Despite the fact that the first two targets had been easy to hit, I knew that I had to keep my focus. I couldn't get cocky because knowing how these challenges were going, they would only get harder.

"Hit right and high!" I commanded Umbreon as another target appeared on her right. I had to make sure I tried to lead her to the right height, though, as the target was now out of reach for a simple straight on hit. Successfully hitting that one, another one appeared behind her. "Behind you Umbreon. Just turn around and don't move."

Just as I suspected, the targets only got harder as some of them appeared in hard to explain positions, while others got much smaller, making them harder to hit. Over time, though, Umbreon and I stayed strong, hitting every target perfectly. We couldn't give in just yet, though; we had a few more let.

"Last set," I heard the dream Ash say. I honestly hadn't been paying much attention to how many him and Pikachu had hit, so I didn't really know if this would determine if we won or not.

Just then a circle of targets surround Umbreon, making it almost impossible for her to hit. I had to really think about this one, knowing that if I hit each one separately, they would disappear before I could hit them all. If I could hit them all or most of them at once, I could get them. I knew there had to be a way since this dream Ash wouldn't give a challenge he knew he himself couldn't complete. So, there had to be a way to do this. But how?

It was an idea that I didn't know would work for sure, but I had to try it. "Umbreon double team now!" A series of Umbreon clones surround the targets. "Now use agility!"

I watched as the little Umbreon clones ran around in a circle, the targets shattering into pieces as Umbreon ran through them. When she hit the last time, I couldn't help but give a smug smile, my plan working perfectly. I heard another beep, indicating the match was over. Taking a deep breath, I looked up at the scoreboard, waiting for the results of the match to be displayed. I knew Umbreon and I had hit every target, but I had yet to know how Ash did.

ASH: 29 GARY: 30

Yes! We had done it; we had won! So the race hadn't been running like I thought, but I didn't care, knowing that I had still beaten him. Now all we needed was one more win and we would save Ash. Who knew I would be competing against a dream version of my rival in order to save the real one? Ash did always have strange friends.

XXX

One more and we would win. That was a lot of pressure on me. Granted, if I lost, we had two more left, but I didn't want to compete anymore. I just wanted to save Ash and get rid of this dream world his girlfriend had created once and for all. Let me tell you, this was not what I expected when Ash had said we were going to Cerulean to visit a friend of his.

"The fourth challenge, and your last if you win, will be a puzzle challenge. Whomever you pick must answer a series of riddles and solve a series of puzzles to uncover a secret word at the end to unlock a gate. All of the riddles and puzzles will have to do with my life, and you will only have twenty minutes to complete the challenge. In this challenge, you may not use Pokemon."

"Well, I don't know who to pick for this one," Misty started saying. "I'm not very good at puzzles, but I'm good at riddles. Since it's not a maze, Brock may not be very good. Gary knows a lot about Ash's life, but I don't know about Dawn."

"I'm not good at these things," Gary told us. "I may be able to know the answer, but I don't know how to solve the puzzle. I think we should send Dawn. She hasn't competed yet. Are you good at puzzles Dawn?"

"I'm okay," I shrugged. I mean, I wasn't bad, but I wasn't great either. My mom was much better than I was since she did the crossword in the paper everyday. Sometimes I would help her so, maybe that would help now. "I don't know as much about Ash as you guys do, though."

"If you need to, you will be allowed to ask your friends to help you on one of the puzzles," the fake Ash told us. Hmm. If I could at least ask Misty about the riddles or them about Ash's life, then maybe I would be okay.

"All right," I agreed. "I'll do it."

"Very well then." After he said that, the field suddenly turned into a series of giant puzzles. It was like a giant puzzle obstacle course. "On the beep."

On the sound of the beep, I ran to the first puzzle. It was one of those puzzles where you had to move things around to create a picture. Since the tiles were all mixed up, I couldn't tell what the picture was or where I should start. With that in mind, I just tried moving around some of the tiles to see if I could get something out of them. As I moved around the tiles, I managed to create the arm of some Pokemon, giving me some idea as to what it might be. I knew there had to be a secret to this whole puzzle thing, as it had to do with his life. If it was a Pokemon that this picture was trying to create, then, based on what the fake Ash had said, it had to be one of Ash's Pokemon.

As I moved the tiles around some more, trying to work around the arm, I noticed a somewhat jagged design on one of the pieces. What Pokemon of Ash's had a jagged tail? After more deliberation, I tried working on the face. It was when I saw the design of two rosy cheeks that I finally figured out what the puzzle was. Of course it was Pikachu. That was Ash's most prized Pokemon, and since this was the first of the puzzles, it was probably going to be pretty easy. With that in mind, I shifted the tiles around until I created a Pikachu. When I was done, the tiles started glowing, as they flipped over to form a giant L and A.

With those letters in mind, I quickly moved on to the next puzzle. It was a giant crossword with only a few clues, making it a little easier. Glancing at the first clue for 1 across, I read it over, but had no idea. _ The name of my mother._ Ugh! I didn't know that! I only knew her as Ms. Ketchum. Deciding I'd work around it, I moved on to the 1 down. _Stole this in order to save myself. _Well, that could be a lot of things…but what would he steal to save himself? Thinking back to what Brock had told me about Ash, I tried to see if something he had said fit this clue.

_"Who's Misty?" I asked Brock._

_ "Misty's an old friend of ours. Ash met her when he stole her bike trying to get away from a flock of Spearow." _

That's it! It was Misty's bike. Ash had stolen her bike to save himself from the flock of Spearow he had managed to tick off. I quickly filled in the boxes and moved on to 2 across. _They follow me in pursuit of one thing. _Well, duh! That was an easy one; it was Team Rocket. _Gave this Pokemon away so it could go with its mate. _Uh…no idea! I could ask Misty and Brock because they would probably know, but I didn't want to use that quite yet. Next one.

_ Alone its song will fail. _Hmm…I know I had heard those words before somewhere. Maybe, in a story my mom told me when I was a kid? I had to figure this one out or I wouldn't be able to work around them. Thinking back to the story my mother had always told me, I remembered something about titans of fire, ice, and lightening. There was a giant Pokemon that would stop their fighting. It began with an L, I remember. Lu-Lu-Lug…Lugia! That's it! Now I remember. How's that have to do with Ash, though? Hmm. No need to worry about that.

Let's see…3 down. _Brother of a female companion I traveled with. _I knew Misty only had sisters, and Brock wasn't a female, so that meant he had to be talking about May. What was her brother's name, though? I remember it also began with an M. Matt? No, that wasn't it. Mark? Max? Yeah! Max! That was it! One more set left to go.

_My rival since childhood. _Gary! It had to be Gary. I couldn't think of anyone else who had known Ash as a kid that he called a rival. Plus, I remember him introducing Gary as his rival.

_Refused to listen to me when it evolved. _Um…ah! I didn't know this one either. I guess I have to go back to the others. Let's see. For the one about the Pokemon he gave away, I have BUTTER. BUTTER wasn't in any Sinnoh Pokemon names that I knew of, nor did I think it was Hoenn or Johto. That meant it had to be a Kanto Pokemon. But, which one? GAH! There are too many! Butter sounded like it was part of Butterfly. Hmm... Butterfree? Yeah, I think that was a Pokemon. I'll just try that. Now for his mom's name.

Let's see…so far I have that it has a D, E, and A in it. Ugh! I don't know! I don't know! I know I had heard her name before, but I couldn't remember it. I had to think hard, though. I remember Professor Oak always saying this girl name when he was around Mrs. Ketchum, but I always assumed he was talking about some other lady. Ugh! What was it? It began with a D…..DELIA! That's it! Okay. One more left. You can do this Dawn.

What Pokemon didn't listen to Ash? Could it be Charizard? I remember him saying he had some trouble with it in the past, but now they were good friends. I had to try it. Writing in Charizard, I waited to see if the crossword started glowing. Sure enough, I must have answered correctly because it started glowing as it flipped over, revealing an S and a Y.

I rushed as fast as I could to the next puzzle. I only had 7 minutes left, so I had to do this quick. I couldn't lose. If not to save Ash, I didn't want him to suffer because I lost. The next puzzle was three different riddles that I had to answer correctly. Ugh… I wasn't very good at riddles. Maybe I would need to ask the others for help on this one.

1. _Changing over the years, it's been stolen from me many times by those who did not send in a million of what you send to a friend when you travel far away. _

2. _Emotions as strong as the place they treasure the most, they would walk around the earth for a scrap of metal charred by volts of power._

3. _Although the finder of it and winner in competition, it did not want me, instead choosing what it saw first._

Hm…I think that first riddle had to be his hat because you would usually send your friend a postcard, and he didn't send in a million of those to get Pikachu. Plus, his hat had been stolen a few times by some of his Pokemon in Sinnoh, so I think that had to be it.

For the second clue, I really didn't know. I was pretty sure it had to be a person, who apparently, had some pretty strong emotions. The only place I could think of that was pretty strong would be an ocean, and the volts must be connected to Pikachu somehow. Maybe it was Misty. I mean she did run water Pokemon gym, and I know she followed Ash because he stole her bike. So, maybe the bike was the scrap of metal. Plus, I'm pretty sure he really liked her, and if you liked someone, you would notice those things.

On the last one I was completely stumped. I mean I had absolutely no idea. I had a pretty good feeling that if I wanted to win this; I would need to ask for some help. But, who should I ask? I could only ask one person. Based on the information, I don't think Gary would be a good choice because he wasn't really with Ash on his journey. Brock who had traveled pretty much everywhere would probably be a good choice, but would he know Ash that well to know the answer? Maybe I should ask Misty since she was one of the answers, but this could have happened in Hoenn when she wasn't there. For that reason alone, I picked Brock.

"I want to ask Brock to help me," I called to the fake Ash. He nodded allowing Brock to run over where I was so he could assist me.

"Which one has you stumped?" Brock asked.

"Number three."

"Hmm." He glanced over the riddles, reading the clues as he tried to decipher what it was talking about. "Oh! I think I know what the answer is."

"Well then tell me." Duh. If he knew, he needed to tell me.

"Right. I think its Togepi. Ash found Togepi as an egg, and when we had a competition over who got to keep it, he won. He didn't keep Togepi, though because it liked-"

"Sorry, Brock! No time!" I'm sure it was a great story, but at this point, I only had 5 minutes left.

He rushed off the field as the board the riddles were on started glowing once again. When it flipped over, the letters this time were an E and an H. Thankfully, as I rushed to the next puzzle, I saw that it was the last one. It was another riddle, using the letters I had gathered.

_Using the letters you have collected from the challenges, you will spell a disguise I used to sneak into a place that had banned me. _

Great… another one to stump me. Ash hadn't been kicked out anywhere in Sinnoh, so I was no help. There were tiles under the riddle that each had one of the letters I had collected on them. As I read them over again-LASYEH-I tried to figure it out. As time passed, I made no progress, only moving the tiles around aimlessly. I was going to cry. I couldn't lose after I had gotten this far. If I lost, yeah we would have another try. But, if I lost, Ash would suffer again, and I couldn't let that happened. HEYALS? No! YALSEH? NO AGAIN! UGH! I need to divide this up somehow. Since it's a disguise, it might be a name. There weren't many boy names that began with Y or H or E, so it had to be an L, A, or S. I guess I'll go in alphabetical order since that was my only option. Boy names that start with A…there's Ash, but I don't think he'd pick his own name if it was a disguise. I'll keep the S, though. So, AS. I didn't know any names with ASY, or ASE, or even ASL. The only option I had was ASH, leaving me with an YLE. I was never going to figure this out. I was crying now. I couldn't figure it out, and I had already used my help on the last puzzle; there was no hope. ASHYLE wasn't a name, nor was ASHEYL when I tried that. There's ASHELY, and then there was ASHLEY. But Ashley was a girl's name, not a boy's name. Ugh! I was never going to figure this out if all I could come up with was girl's name. As I closed my eyes, letting the tears fall down my cheeks, I saw the tiles grow a bright blue. _No way_, I thought. There was no way I could have been right.

"You have completed the challenge in the time allowed," I heard a voice say from behind me.

After that I felt the wind get knocked at me as someone crushed me in a hug. "You did it Dawn!" Misty cried. "You did it! You saved him! You saved Ash!"

I had done it. I had won, giving us three victories. We had saved Ash and defeated the Unown.

"As I promised, your friend will now be safe and the Unown will be taken away to a place where nobody can find them again. Congratulations."

The fake Ash vanished into thin air and we were transported back to the couch where Ash still was.

XXX

"Ash! You're alive!" I heard Misty yell.

She ran over to me and threw her arms around me, giving me a hug as she squeezed really tight. I never knew someone so happy to see me other than my mom. Once again, I was left thinking, what happened?

"Well of course I'm alive," I told her. I hadn't died, and I'm pretty sure my life wasn't in any danger. At least, to my knowledge it hadn't been. Granted I was still in a lot of pain for unexplained reasons, but I wasn't dying. "What are you talking about?"

She moved her face so that she was looking at me, loosening her grip on me but not letting go. She moved one of her hands to brush the hair out of my eyes before pressing her forehead against mine, giving me a smile.

"You're okay," she breathed. I could feel her warm breath hit my face when she spoke. For lack of a better word, this was slightly awkward. She was really close to my face, and I no idea what was going to happen next. "You're okay."

"Mist," I called her name, "I'm okay. I'm not going anywhere."

And that's when it happened. When she got even closer and kissed me. It was a short kiss, but the shock of it overwhelmed me. I had not been expecting that at all. After that, I don't know if it was because of the pain I was in or the shock of what happened, but I passed out.

* * *

><p><strong><em>O<em>ne more chapter after this. I'm sorry if my riddles weren't that creative. Hopefully, though, you were able to have a little fun trying to figure them out. Thanks to all that have reviewed throughout this story. **


	9. Bury the Castle

_If it's not real_  
><em> You can't hold it in your hand<em>  
><em> You can't feel it with your heart<em>  
><em> And I won't believe it<em>

When I opened my eyes, I was in a place I didn't recognize. Everything around me was white from the walls to the sheets that covered my body. This was definitely not Misty's gym or the Pokemon Center. There was even an IV in my right hand that was connected to a large stand with bags of fluids. There was only one place I could be: the hospital. Glancing down at the IV on my hand, I noticed some coloring that contrasted my skin color, making it very noticeable. Upon further investigation, I discovered that the coloring belonged to Misty's hand, which she had resting on my arm, while her head was resting in the space between the end of the bed and I. From the looks of it, she was still sleeping.

"Pikapi?" I heard Pikachu say. I watched him rise from the end of the bed and look in my direction. When he saw that I was awake, his eyes lit up as he bounded across the bed and into my arms. "Chaaa."

"Hey, buddy," I greeted him, scratching his favorite spot between his ears. He cooed affectionately, happy to be with me once again. "I missed you. Have you been here all day?"

"Pika!" he replied, nodding his head. I glanced at Misty, wondering how long she had been here. "Pikachupi ka pikapi."

"Her, too, huh?" I said rather absentmindedly. Breaking my gaze on her, I turned back to Pikachu. "She kissed me you know?" I told him. "Before I passed out."

"PIKA!" he cried, his eyes getting wide.

"Yeah. I was surprised, too." He just twitched his head, using his leg to scratch behind his ear. Guess it wasn't surprising to him. "I don't know what I'm going to do, though."

"Pi?" he asked, turning his head to the side. "Pikapi pi pi pikachupi."

"I can't Pikachu," I told him. "I know the truth, and I'll only hurt her."

XXX

Once Ash woke up and they checked him over, they let him return back to the gym with a clean bill of health. I hadn't been there when he had woken up, but Misty was since she had been there since they let her go see him. Despite the fact that we had saved him, she still felt guilty about him being there, claiming that it was all her fault. I had given up long ago trying to convince her otherwise, knowing she would always feel this way. Since he was no longer needed, once Ash was deemed back to normal, Gary returned to Pallet leaving Dawn, Misty and I.

Since we needed to get back to Sinnoh so that Dawn could get home, we had decided that we would leave the next morning on a ferry. It had definitely been an adventure coming to visit Misty, but I couldn't help but worry about leaving her so soon after it had happened. I knew she was still shaken up by the events, and she would only be returning to what had led her to do those things in the first place. As I was finishing packing up, I heard someone come into my room, the covers on the bed lowering under their weight as they sat down. Looking up, I saw that it was none other than Ash himself.

"Hey. You all finished packing?" I asked him. "We leave first thing in the morning remember."

He nodded, but didn't say anything. Setting down the clothes I was trying to cram into my bag, I walked over and sat down next to him. Something was bothering him, and hopefully he had come to be to talk about it. I knew that this was something important, too because Ash never really talked about things, mostly keeping them inside. The only time I had ever known him to open up was when he would talk to Misty. But even then, it was only very rarely.

"Brock," he said, his voice cracking a bit. "What's love?"

"Well, Ash, there really isn't a exact definition for love. People explain it in so many different ways that nobody really knows. Sometimes people think they know, but it turns out they were wrong, while others have no idea, but end up stumbling upon it without even knowing. Love isn't really a concrete ting. it's more a feeling," I explained to him. "Why do you ask?"

"But how do you know you're in love?" he asked, ignoring my question. I had a feeling I knew exactly what this was about, but I didn't want to be the one to bring it up. I wanted to see if he could figure it out himself. "I mean you don't just decide randomly. There's usually reasons behind it, right?"

"Sure. But there can be lots of reasons why. Usually your physical attracted to the person, meaning you think they're pretty or handsome. You can't imagine your life about them, and when they aren't around, you sometimes miss them so much that it hurts you inside. Whenever you're near them you can't help but feel happy, or when they smile you can't help but smile yourself. You like them just the way they are, even for the things you may see as their faults. And, I think most importantly, they make you feel good about yourself and help you grow as a person."

"But what if the things they say can really hurt you sometimes, but you still want to be around them?"

"That's love." Obviously he was talking about him and Misty fighting.

"And when you catch yourself thinking about them every time you see them? Like when you see an ocean or you see someone riding by on a bike?"

"Hmm. Love, too." He was being a little too obvious.

"How about if you would be willing to put off your journey for a bit just so you could be around them like the old times? Or when they kiss you, and you're shocked at first, but when you think about it more, you kind of, maybe, wish it would happen again?"

"Love," I replied. "And also love."

"Oh."

"I got one for you."

"Okay."

"Love is also when everyone else can tell that you love, say, I don't know, a feisty, red-headed runt, but yourself," I smirked.

"Is it really that obvious?" he asked, catching on to what I was saying.

"Does Misty like water Pokemon?"

XXX

"I-I have to go now, Mist," he told me, a small frown on his face. He stood in front of me wearing the clothes he first had on when he got here. On his head sat Pikachu who looked just as sad as he did. "Dawn and Brock are waiting for me."

"Now?" I asked even though I knew the answer.

"I'm sorry," he replied.

I just nodded my head in understanding. I really didn't want to have to see him go, but I knew he had to. He had no reason to stay here with me, his life being out there where he could travel freely.

"You'll come back and visit, though, right?"

"Of course," he assured me. He looked down at the ground, scraping his foot across the ground in front of him. Another one of the signs he was holding back from saying something. "Hey Mist?"

"Hm?"

"I'll-I'll miss you," he told me. And rather awkwardly and in an uncoordinated fashion he leaned forward and hugged me.

I could only imagine how much courage it took him to hug me. Relaxing, I hugged him back, holding on a bit tighter than I probably needed to. I didn't want him to leave, wanting him to stay a bit longer. Also, I could have sworn I felt him squeeze me really tight for a few seconds.

"Bye Mist," he told me as he pulled away and kissed me on the cheek, shoving a small piece of paper in my hand. "I'll be back before you know it."

He turned around and ran down the path after that, Pikachu calling his own goodbye from atop Ash's head. As I watched him run down the path, I lifted my hand to touch the cheek he had kissed, the spot still warm and a little sticky. I knew it wasn't exactly the ending I was hoping for, but maybe that small kiss on the cheek had meant something deep down. Maybe when he came back, I could finally gain the courage to tell him how I felt. One day, maybe he would even love me back.

_Mist,_

_ I don't know what to think now, but I think I have a pretty good idea. Hopefully by the time I return, I'll have it all figured out. In the meantime, don't go making any more wishes. Until then, I'll miss you and stay safe. _

_ Love Ash_

Whatever it was, I knew that this time, I could wait.

* * *

><p>Thanks to all that have ever reviewed this story or read it! I hope you enjoyed it. And for those who want to know, here are the full lyrics to the song I used.<p>

Well, she lives in a fairy tale  
>Somewhere too far for us to find<br>Forgotten the taste and smell  
>Of the world that she's left behind<p>

It's all about the exposure  
>The lens I told her<br>The angles were all wrong now  
>She's ripping wings off of butterflies<p>

Keep your feet on the ground  
>When your head's in the clouds<p>

Well, go get your shovel  
>And we'll dig a deep hole<br>To bury the castle, bury the castle

Go get your shovel  
>And we'll dig a deep hole<br>To bury the castle, bury the castle

So one day he found her crying  
>Coiled up on the dirty ground<br>Her prince finally came to save her  
>And the rest you can figure out<p>

But it was a trick and the clock struck twelve  
>Well, make sure to build your heart<br>Brick by boring brick  
>Or the wolf's gonna blow it down<p>

Keep your feet on the ground  
>When your head's in the clouds<p>

Well, go get your shovel  
>And we'll dig a deep hole<br>To bury the castle, bury the castle

Go get your shovel  
>And we'll dig a deep hole<br>And we'll bury the castle, bury the castle

Well, you built up a world of magic  
>Because your real life is tragic<br>Yeah, you built up a world of magic

If it's not real  
>You can't hold it in your hand<br>You can't feel it with your heart  
>And I won't believe it<p>

But if it's true  
>You can see it with your eyes<br>Oh, even in the dark  
>And that's where I want to be, yeah<p>

Go get your shovel  
>And we'll dig a deep hole<br>To bury the castle, bury the castle

Go get your shovel  
>And we'll dig a deep hole<br>To bury the castle, bury the castle


End file.
